what didn't kill me didn't make me stronger, bye 2009

another year has passed, but time didnt fly, time limped along like an arthritic amputee, unlike the previous 2 years. many people would say that so many things happened so quickly they lacked the opportunity to stop, breathe and think. unlike them, i have been privileged, especially the past few weeks when on the days when I was in camp, I literally had nothing at all to do except to wear my smart 4 and do last parade. lunch was a welcome period of socialization that broke the monotony of stoning on facebook playing bejeweled blitz and reading random junk like financial statecraft, which is a horrible book by the way.

as expected, over the past year my brain has slowed down a lot. it has evolved, from being a somewhat absorbent sponge to the metal 555 sieve you get at $2 a piece from your friendly neighborhood hardware store. i dont retaining anything of value and i dont recall anything anymore. i have become lazy to recall, i just call people up to ask. its not a cheap habit and i hope to kick it. the past few days i spent at wrl studying my french, which was quite ineffective. i fell in love with the mother in the story, you know the dumb feuilleton, and afterwards her daughter. all i can remember is that they run un petit restaurant dans un petit village a le cote d'azur. in fact i have been studying french on and off ever since my engineer days when i confirmed my scholarship, and i realized that i havent remembered much.

in a word, for me, 2009 is 'phail', as leonard from my bslc section likes to say and spell it. i have never been rejected so many times and so completely ever before throughout my pathetic 19 years on the face of the earth. of course the first and the most painful failure, now as then would be my failure to go to ocs. yes, it is evident that i would not have passed out from ocs because theres no way im going to pass soc, but thats not important. what is, is that i did not even get selected to go. that ive fallen outside of the top 8%. unlike some friend i made in secondary school, i will not say that the system has been a failure, because it hasnt been. i had been the failure. looking back, i regret taking life in bmt so lightly. i went to bmt hoping to go to ocs, but after i set foot on the island, my psyche gets rewired to try to live through day to day to the bookout. i concede that i hadnt performed well and i didnt wayang. wayanging is important especially for noobs like me who have many glaring flaws out in the open to be picked on. it always helps to have a flower on a pile of cowdung. which shouldnt be the rafflesia.

my failure to enter ocs probably catalysed the cascade of epic failures along the way. i remember going for my commission interview just into my 2nd week of bslc, where they plainly asked me why i did not make it to ocs. i was completely honest with them, i told them i was pussier than those who went to ocs, but i would still work hard. i guess working hard is not good enough for them. singapore needs people who can work, not people who try to work. its the result that counts, not the effort. and when they have so many talented people to choose from they can afford to be choosy. anyway, a digression...all this must be the fault of my dear bmt pc, who called them to reschedule my interview instead of letting me book out for field camp. who knows, the result might have been different if i had done it before going to sispec, just like how some champions had done it before they got prb and kicked out of ocs for reasons apart from injuries. anyway to add salt to my festering, maggot filled wound, rumor has it that someone who drank soap in bmt got it. now i respect that he is one talented guy, but this is stretching it.

my rejection from ocs has been haunting me ever since. every corner i turn, someone has to ask, kindly or snidely. people keep asking me why an rj guy cannot even go to ocs. and as always, i have to tell them that i sucked, which might not have been completely true but which i have come to accept. i will always remember my fellow rafflesn who happened to be with me during the assessment center. she continuously stabbed at my wound, like a cheap matador trying to weaken the bull with many tassels stabbed at the bullpenis. of course i let vengeance control my actions that day and Fortune favored the Brave (me).

i would like to digress, that they shouldnt come up with the newfangled initiative of renaming sispec scs because whatever you name it, its just for people who did not make it to ocs. its like naming normal normal. like my bslc pc said, sispec has become a place for wannabes to nurse their wounds. comme l'hopital des invalides, for veterans of bloody wars, even though these vets probably only fought some sandflies and maybe a wild boar or two. in the army its just officers, ncos and men, simple. i remember my final interview with ceo ies, where he just kept asking me so specialist is nco and i had to keep saying yes. it sounds funny, but sitting there alone in the room at the last hurdle, wanting and needing to impress, it can be harrowing. it might even be the death knell, but luckily it wasnt.

my poor performance in the army and in front of the commission silenced the bell of pride that might have tolled inside of me. the scholarship helped me salvage some pride and of course gave me the opportunity to study overseas and thats assuming i dont cock up my admission, like how i cocked up my us apps. ok i admit i didnt actually put in any effort, i never thought i would get in so i was applying for fun, but i was even rejected by lse. which is really, really poor. but im going to try to turn things around, now that ive set myself to work hard at french and dominate the interview come 2nd quarter next year. i really need to clinch it and at least confirm myself a job. it wouldnt be the best of jobs, but hey, it would be a very good job to start with.

i wouldnt talk about the other rejections, like my outright rejection by nus scholarships, spower and what not, because compared to those 2 bombshells, these are like blanks. they made a sound but left no mark on whatever was left on me.

if theres one thing i have learnt in the army, its that there are great people and there are shitty people and they come in all forms, regardless of race, language or religion. and rank. probably the guy who made the greatest positive impact on my army life would be my sispec pc, who knew from the onset that i was just one foamer who was probably going to ooc because outfield is going to tear his skin up and hes going to get tretinoin sooner or later. he happened to know of my a level results, which is nothing to shout about really, more than 100 people alone from one school got it, and he got me to be his pa to edit stuffs for him while the other fall out boys were digging happily at the soc ground. i was there in front of the computer all alone, enjoying the air conditioning typing rubbish that nobody was going to read at all. he trusted me, and he gave me time off to 'center myself' so that i would better perform. thanks to him i booked out 7 times for interviews and stayed out on a sunday night. towards the end he got a little irritated, but he still continued giving me les cartes blanches and shielding me, especially one day when i was late for morning parade cos the night before i booked in at like 2300 and didnt unpack anything so i couldnt find some stuffs. i guess i also didnt let him down, by doing quite well at the sil tests. lol.

my time at eti was probably the most miserable throughout the year. never had there been so many screwed up people been so concentrated in one place. the pc was a highflying warrant who is brilliant at carrying balls and squeezing balls. i remember him not allowing me to go for my final discussion, luckily the oc was there and he intervened. this devious guy always had on an angelic mask and tried to appear concerned about his men and all that, but he probably wasnt. i remember him being a real dick one day and delaying our bookout by 2h cos of some foamy standby bed of such a high standard my father was left waiting outside and i never had him pick me up again. i enjoyed some of the detonation practicals, but the overall experience of regimentation and water parades after the laxness of sispec made me throw in the towel. i ooced on the last day of the 4 week course, which i will not regret, because i dont want to go to gedong.

the wsm was also a dick, but this i realized only after ooc-ing. ooc life is supposed to be next to heavenly in camp, but he made it depressing. i remember him posting us to the guardhouse and telling us that its a shitty posting so he will not question what happens there, what shit we had to suck up and what welfare we got. we did well at the guardhouse, the mps liked us, the csm liked us. he gave us nights offs tuesday and thursday. which we took. and then came one fine day when this fat ass called to say that we must book in that night cos he understood this and that differently. i hate being threatened and being railed at so i didnt take to his unreasonable behavior very well. the oc also turned crazy and wanted to cancel nights outs for oocs. luckily the csm shielded us, and for this i respect him a lot. he was a firm and fair person, who was very welfare. he took care of the people under his charge, even the attached personnel. ir emember him bringing us to the safsa celebration and the chinook landing. i remember him allowing me to go for the firefly rehearsals. of course there were the nice mp specs, the only truly nice people i met in nee soon. on top of she bang you. who is the best mo i have ever come across. he is the most understanding ever and he is one who just puts the cards out on the table. he can double up as your lifecoach and give adam khoo a run for his money. without she bang you, i dont think i would be this happy now.

looking back, engineers was a hellhole, if not for the hwachong oocs.

when i went to iti, i thought i entered hell too. iti was supposed to be a choice posting, and my dear friend stho was already at iti. often he extolled the virtues of the camp. it was slack, relaxed and above all, stayout. i salivated.

then on my second day there i met this person, who just made me foam. he is still myindirect superior, but he was a nasty guy who had illusions of himself being justice bao. he was mean and started talking to me about what could be done and what couldnt and what is saf approved what isnt and all that nonsense. i still dont like him, because he has high standards and can be a little bit too particular about things. i suppose you need someone like him around here to make sure that at least some work is done so team2 wont plunge into darkness and fail lri. so far, i have avoided him and whenever i see him i act respectfully, apologize for any shortcoming, real or perceived and just scoot off. the other people in camp are just nuah, and i like my superiors who are both nice people who let me off for all my firefly activities.

subsequently i went for the cq course, which was a complete waste of time. this was the paragon of what would happen if inefficient and unmotivated clowns are led by a clown with gradiose vision of distant ends with little concrete plans on how to get there. the course was a joke, more than half the time we were just sitting around staring into space. if not for my nice bunk and some people i met along the way, like kek who posted out and khairul my future boss with whom i discussed some issues and aired some views, i would have died. it was on this course where chaokenging came out en masse as throngs of people took mc every weekend and people wiggled out of shitty situations by playing the medical card.

i was guilty of this myself to get into fsg fsg, basically the group that completely wont sleep outfield, i told the conducting who initially told me to bathe outfield with jerry cans that i and a few others would report sick the very day the exercise began. attendance was poor and the auditors were coming down i suppose, so he relented. that was a minor success and my first step towards diplomacy and common action. lol.

without learning anything relevant because i was day dreaming or discussing politics or just staring at the water point, i returned to iti where i currently am and would be for about a year more. i hope the time here will be smooth sailing, i will continue with my french lessons and do well and ord and go to france! yay.

if theres something i have learnt this year, it would be to expect the worst. i used to laugh at all those dumb safety assessment checklists all over the camp, where they says no shifting of chairs ncase people trip and fall. its not a joke. shit like this happen. my storeman cut his head while moving conc wire and im still puzzled how he did it. on top of it, when things looked like they were going to reach fruition, something just comes along to mess it up. there are so many examples but i am too lazy to mention them.

apart, my experience has reaffirmed that might is right. it doesnt matter how watertight you find your argument to be and it doesnt matter that its more logical to clean the safety goggles before lining them instead of lining them and then cleaning them some other time, but it actually doesnt matter. what usually matters is that crap and those inverted chevrons. of course, those with rank shouldnt go about abusing those without, just as rousseau mentioned the weak can connive to bring down the strong, we might be little spawnlings but we can find strength in unity so dont be the force behind the unity. anyway in this camp, i notice many little spawnlings spend their time praying for the their perceived tyrants to get posted out, fired, or to die. lol.

as a small fry, your words and actions dont carry weight at all. seriously no one really cares and it helps for you to talk less so you have to do less, cos when you do less you have more lepak time and make less mistakes so less chance to kena fk. there is no incentive to work, to think, to improve so it helps if one doesnt do any of the above too much. or at least exercise some caution. i have seen too many people with too much initiative who kena fk. but of course, this is the army, try this in real life and you will foam. some skills that are important in the army becomes less important outside, mainly the skill to look like youre working when youre not.

i have never bothered myself with thinking about how things can be better because this requires too much effort and too little returns. by the time anything constructive gets done i would have ord-ed, and they wont like call me back to give me institute best soldier, and anyway by that point i wont need or want it or them to call me back. but its alright. anyway life here as of now is as good as i can expect from an army camp.

I'm Starting With The Man In The Mirror
I'm Asking Him To Change His Ways
And No Message Could Have Been Any Clearer
If You Wanna Make The World
A Better Place
MJ RIP

If theres anything, I hope to be a better person, just like how i have hoped to be a better person and always failed. i know deep down inside that im quite a faggot and i thank all my friends for tolerating me, especially stho for tolerating my oblique insults in and out of camp, and mark for humoring me, and zhenan and aaron for all the fun i had. i hope to spend more time with my french, seriously mugging it. i hope to read more, especially in camp, instead of playing hobo prison brawl so that i know more and can transit into uni life better and contribute better to my work in the future.

of course i hope i can get a girlfriend, but as usual, this is a lost cause. cos im too much of an underachieving foamer. i will try my best but i will not be a toad lusting after swans flesh. i hope that my friends will help remind me. hahaha.

goodbye 2009.

hello 2010!