Chinese New Year
In army, your scope of existence is definitely limited. The people I work with are solid, dependable people, and we can definitely do what we have to do well. But what you can and cannot do is so circumscribed in there. Which is why, when bookout day comes, we'll all be looking forward to the outside world. To be able to have the chance to put all this new experience into the context of real life again, I guess. The prospect of booking out always adds a certain sharpness, and extra energy, to all that we do. Everything looks better in the light of the outside world. One thing that has to be said about army life, is that it really does make you appreciate things you have on the outside more.
And so it's Chinese New Year time! Congratulations and prosperity in abundance to all. Keep yourselves safe, everyone, and may the surprises keep coming this year! Heh it's good to be able to see the extended family again. Missed out on the big reunion dinner this year, so these few days would be the only time to at least catch a glimpse of their faces. Interestingly enough, they didn't really mention much about my hair. Which was just as well, really, because I don't particularly fancy repeating the same story over and over again.
Also met an old family friend who's currently working in MFA, and her French boyfriend who works in Hong Kong. Interesting convergence of circumstances, isn't it? Anyway her work does sound enticing...working on policy with regards to multilateral diplomacy, touching on stuff like ASEAN and the IAEA. (Oh, and I guess you'd want to know about the PSC interview too. It went better than I expected, actually. The people were rather nice, except for a bit of dryness here and there. Beyond that I can't say much. Results out in a month. The highlight of that day was actually not so much the interview but the two hours of free time after that in which I could be alone...communal living does take away something indefinable, the calmness of solitude, or something like that.)
Then meeting up with old friends too. Had dinner and went to Esplanande with Pui Man on Friday night, and yet again Esplanade delivers! There was this rather upbeat and optimistic Indonesian band called Mocca playing there...the songs were as hopeful and amusing as the stuff we'd do for Fruits and Veggies, I thought. And then halfway through the sky suddenly exploded with grenades of colour. The fireworks were definitely a nice surprise...didn't know that they would be letting any off on Friday night. I think the taste of surprises goes well with the bayside atmosphere. Just what a nice pleasant island like Singapore needs to make it really exciting - the tang of unpredictability.
And then tomorrow moving on to catch up with the Texprog people, and the class as well. Staying in the east side because book in is at 1945 tomorrow, which isn't bad, really. The trend seems to be that our book ins get later and later, which is a nice trend to have =P Dunno how things will work out tomorrow...I expect the army experience will tend to set the present apart from the past, and the boys apart from the girls. One just hopes that enough remains the same that we can continue to come together.
In other news...field camp coming up next week. I expect it'll definitely be an eye opener. It will certainly stretch some people to the breaking point. For me, I think it'll only be uncomfortable. The only real fear is of hurting myself somehow, and not so much the normal stuff like fear of snakes or spiders and so on. It's something surprising that I discovered, that I'm actually not the one least equipped to adapt to army life. I put it down to all the trips I've had the privilege of taking. Experience is a powerful defence, I've come to learn - once you know you can physically and mentally do something, that something becomes less fearsome. Anyway I guess we'll see what happens. The challenge will be how to keep healthy and to keep learning.
Also big weapon handling tests coming up. Interesting shift in perspective here, to come to see tests as something that doesn't need to be done on paper. I realise that in the beginning I'd not really taken weapons seriously. They were just tools to be mastered, not used in combat. It was one thing to be able to strip and assemble a rifle in record time, and another thing entirely to shoot someone with it. It continues to be a big psychological barrier, the prospect of firing a real rifle, of throwing a live grenade. It's something that scares me terribly, because for so much destructive power, there are only so few ways to control it. So many things can go wrong. And who will be able to take full responsibility for that enormity that we call a life?
Anyway, enough with the gloomy thoughts. Have to enjoy these few days because next bookout is rather far away, on the 11th! This weekend will have to create enough good humour and happy memories to last two weeks. Heh...after so long we still can't escape the pressure of time, eh?
A Change of Perspective
Am back from camp! Hehheh it's been really all right so far, and nothing much to report (at any rate we're now apparently prohibited from discussing training for the large part...probably falls under the category of State Secret. I'll write more somewhere inaccessible, if I can find the time). Haven't really been about with the soldiering business, just getting used to standing in rank, being briefed endlessly, filling in a surprising number of survey forms, and addressing superiors. In fact it's much like OBS, I think, except with, shockingly, much better food =P Of course we're all aware that the real stuff hasn't begun yet...it's only this awkward placement of Hari Raya that's stopping the sergeants from really hammering us into shape. But so far...good impressions all around: nice sergeants, good section-mates, a solid and interesting platoon.
I have to say, particularly, that the strong point of this enlistment must be the change of perspective. While I'd be the last to say that JC wasn't wholly fun, there's nothing that quite comes close to the tight integration you can get in an all-male environment. It feels, really, like the unnecessary social strictures are stripped away to leave the barest of Spartan military protocol. And when you remove the trimmings the essentials become clearer - the need to work together, to think of the collective good, to take care of everyone else, and in so doing take care of yourself.
And it makes you appreciate the smallest pleasures to the maximum. 20 minute meal times become generous, standing in rank is better than marching along, wearing the jockey cap is better than the helmet, the one-hour break every night is Valhalla, and all this climaxes in the truly visceral experience of marching down the pier at Tekong and boarding the slightly rocking ferry. Everyone in high spirits, everyone's mind focused only on that one thing: to get on the boat without screwing anything up. The waves themselves look inviting. It came as quite a surprise, that, with your uniform still stiff with newness, your pack weighing on your back, you can take so much enjoyment in your boots sounding on the concrete floor, your eyes roving across the straits, and you and your buddy discussing how best to spend the next day.
It struck me that it was really like going on a one-day holiday, an overnight stay at a good hotel. Heh, it really is all determined by your sense of perspective.
Hmm...but I think fun and games will be over soon. Now we're practically just playing soldiers, dressing up in the costume, not really doing anything serious. But soon we'll get our weapons, and we'll go out for jungle training, to learn the real craft of being a warrior. Don't really know if I can accept that, really. The physical side, fine, it'll be good for me, definitely. But to have the power to kill someone else, regardless of whether it's justifiable or not - that is too much of a responsibility for me, I think. Even if it's in self-defence, to protect the things and people you hold dear, I'm not sure I can fire a gun or throw a grenade at another living person. The trick, I guess, is then to regard the enemy as inhuman, but at the moment it strikes me as inherently repulsive, self-delusional, even absurd. I agree with the need to protect the people (this nebulous entity, the "country", and the shadowy being, the "government", is another matter), but is killing another person ever worth it? What do you give up in so doing, and how do you weigh that the life of your enemy is worth less than that of your family? I'd rather have both, in truth, and this automatic assumption in the military that you can only have one or the other is an uncomfortable one.
Heh...so much for the military being a holiday from thinking. It's not that you don't think. There's plenty of stuff to think about, and plenty of time, over the last few days, to do it in. It's just that you really don't have much in the way of expressing it. My section and platoon is a jolly, joking, altogether wholesome bunch, but I don't think they'd be able to understand. And anyway each has enough to worry about; don't think I should add some metaphysical philosophical problem to their plate. It's only in the dead of the night, in the nebulous time between lights-out and actual sleep, that the doubts become something to really contend with.
But...I guess I'll work something out. We all have to work something out at the end of the day, and still, we hope that we'll never have to prove our conviction on the battlefield. But in the meantime, it's time to enjoy the leave, and to catch up on some sleep, and to relish the feeling of civilian life again!
On the Brink of Tomorrow
A little over twelve hours remaining, and I feel that I am ready to face this. No dread, no fear, just reasonable apprehension. Because, now I realise, there is really nothing to fear. NS is a conceptual vacuum. If there is anything worth fearing, I don't yet know of it, and I want to enjoy what could very well be my last moments of peace of mind =P But yeah...in a rather startling realisation I noticed that the last time I felt anything like this was just before Frexprog One...faced with the big unknown, not knowing what to expect, and basically going in blind. That time changed practically everything afterwards. Maybe this time will be the same too. Looking to learn something from this time, for better or for worse.
Anyway, was watching the CD that they gave us during prom. Actually, there were two videos on it...the sappy one they tried to show during the dinner, and a much better one (in my opinion) matched, surprisingly and evocatively, to Yann Tiersen's music for Amelie. Hmm...I didn't exactly want to be immortalised in exactly that way, but ah well, it's done I guess. And it's something to look back to certainly. When I was watching it the memories and the relationships and the people that appeared on the screen cut through all the skepticism to appeal to the part of me that still goes soft at sentimentality. A deep part that defies expression, that befuddles sympathy. Something deeply personal that still yearns for the times depicted in those pictures, that is private, that cannot be shared no matter how many people there are in the group. Do you remember where you were, then, when...
But on the brink of this new adventure, I'm glad to have my friends and family around me. Narnia on Wed, then yesterday was the marathon movie thing with Thong, Vaish, Sots and Kay Hwee. Hehheh...I think I can develop a taste for Bollywood movies. Vaish is right...the key is to suspend disbelief =P Well, it was nice to have all of them in the house. Good of Thong to turn up even though he went in this morning. It was good to have everyone together again, at least. Heh, and Dad had the idea of celebrating my birthday last night. But how to find time? There's no time left for the little ceremonies. Actually felt bad for Dad and the others that we couldn't make a bigger thing out of it. It felt like something that, for their sakes as much as for mine, should have been more...impressive.
And then had Pui Man over today - had one last joust with the old guitars. Dad was around too to add some real skill to what turned out to be a great big singalong =P Then there was Maksim on the telly and a full-blown tickling contest with Marcus who periodically switched sides and basically was sanctioned to have a go at everyone...Hehheh, childish fun, but it was fun all the same! And now and then one must suspend disbelief, eh? And just enjoy whatever you find yourself in the middle of.
And then tomorrow will be setting out with lots of family to Tekong itself - and we'll see what happens from there, I guess. It'll be great to have the guys and my family around me at this time, at the time of great dislocation. Yeah...like I said, it's a good feeling to know that you have people feeling concerned for you. To feel part of a vibrant and reliable community. That, I think, will be where my strength comes from. The strength to face this great void and fill it with whatever I have to do.
So yes, I guess I do face this with high spirits. Yes, it will call for leaving some things behind, but I find now that I can trust that those things will wait for me. That there is something solid and unchangeful to base memory on. And that anchor point is the most important thing, I think, when facing the future.
Thinking Back
Do you remember where we were when...
Narnia
Watched The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe today, and it was brilliant! The colours, the rousing soundtrack, the stirring plot, and the surprising religious connotations. And Aslan! The Great Cat! The gravity in that voice, the sheer accepting enduring dignity in that poise at the Stone Table, the wisdom deep and heavy in those eyes, and the compassion that stops him from telling the children what they should not yet know. A stirring film, that...though at this point I can't remember the book at all. And I definitely didn't see so many religious connotations the first time round. Time to reread it I think.
Was watching the film, and afterwards having dinner with Vaish and YS, with the awareness that it was probably the last film I'd watch before Saturday. And the last dinner out. Hmm...it adds a sharper flavour to everything, I think, the awareness of time running out. Everything more in focus because you're trying to remember everything, just so you have a refuge to retreat to if things don't turn out as nice as you'd like it. Tomorrow the kids coming over for a movie-watching marathon. For some of them it'd be the day before enlistment. Well, I hope it's a worthy send-off for them at least!
Yeah...NS. At this point in time I'm hanging between wishing it was now so I could get it over with, and wishing that it was later. There's not enough time to do something big, and yet too much time to bear doing nothing. But still it's not really fear, like I said...just apprehension. Swinging alternatively between the view that it's a dangerous challenge and that it's just a new and strenuous adventure. The attraction of the unknown underlined by real physical danger now, made all the more ominous beacuse you know what is possible (everyone's heard the stories of injuries and even deaths) but not what is probable.
Packing the auxiliary stuff for NS, was thinking whether or not all this is necessary. No idea why we would need all that black tape, really, though for handymen you apparently can't have too much of it. I guess it's just a safety buffer, to give you more options if the NS prescribed kit proves to be inadequate in some way. Prudence, I guess. Hope for the best (that the NS pple have prepared everything well), but prepare for the worst.
Anyway...uni stuff. Had PSC psychological interview today. Basically two hours of spilling out your life story to a psychologist. A bit disconcerting, because the doctor is a stranger, and yet you know you have to tell her as much as you would your family for her to do her job. Telling her more than her social position vis-a-vis me warrants. Or at least, you have to make it sound like the truth...but lying under such conditions is too tedious, I think. The very least is to try to protect people's privacy; the only person you can libel is yourself. And to make it as interesting for the both of you as possible. The biggie, though, is still pending...PSC is apparently organising the time-slots now.
And Cambridge finally got back to us! Got an AAA for St. John's, and I'm very relieved. On the way home today, after being notified by the VJ pple that the letters were out, there was a moment of distant clarity when I realised that I could conceivably bear not going to Cambridge - a reminder that originally I had not wanted to go there. But then the familiar tension of a critical decision being made came back. And now that the offer's out I feel much better. Either way the wait is over.
But then I also realise exactly how provisional it is. It not only relies on the grades, but also on the scholarship. This is, after all, a big step, but only one of three crucial steps, all of which must fall into place for this to work. We'll see how the rest turns out lar...but I'm glad for this at least. One less thing to worry about, and that means that the process is now back in my control. It'd be up to me, now, to convince the PSC to take me into their scholarships.
Kels got an offer too, which is, naturally, also a relief. It's good not to have to compete anymore with someone I hold in such high regard. Waiting on Chern's result, though seeing as she isn't in town that could take a while. If the three of us end up in SPS at Cam then that would be perfect!
Anyway! On the eve of enlistment it's not a productive use of time to worry bout this thing. Will think of tomorrow's movie thing instead. Need to tidy up the house. And now that I actually got the cement I can repair the ship, setting everything in order at home, before I leave for Tekong.
2006
There are not many things that are as awesome and thrilling as a live fireworks display.
Yesterday was at the bayside waiting to usher in 2006, even though I was feeling a bit under the weather. Phew...what a heck of a lot of people over there! Heh, I guess people will flock to wherever there is fun to be had. And it is heartening to see everyone out for a good time at the bayside, flooding into the streets - at least those which were not cordoned off by the police. While the people will not cross police lines, at least they will go right up to them and try to push them back. Which, I think, is a rather hopeful sign for Singapore =P
Mmm well, eventually, after wandering from Esplanade to the Esplanade Bridge to One Fullerton YS and I decided to just end up at the bayside area almost under the Sheares Bridge, where we had a front-row seat to view the bay area. Right in front of us the baywater played chicken with our feet. To the right was the river mouth with the strange arrangements of balloons floating in the water, lit up by the spots from the Esplanade Bridge. To the left was the Sheares Bridge, and right in front of us was the New Downtown field.
It was very tasteful, I thought, the display for the new year. The bubbles on the water were simple yet surprising to look at, and they really used the spots well to create colours on the water and in the air, where a slight fog had conveniently appeared. Rather minimalist, elegant, and, I thought, dignified. And when the fireworks started firing from right in front of us on the field, it was a real surprise. Yes...there are few things as stunning as those grenades of colour exploding a few hundred metres away from you. It creates a feeling of collective awe and delight, something sweet and childish in the air. However the old year was, the end of the old and the beginning of the new cannot but be upbeat with fireworks.
But it has been a really good year...it has been a really good two years, to boot. Heh, you would remember me grousing about the new school last year. Starting anew, I was looking backwards. But it has been a surprising two years, I think, filled with exciting and overall rather happy moments. The crowning moments must, of course, be the overseas trips. Texprog and Bangkok introduced many good people to me, and opened up whole new horizons to be explored. It was the time to indulge in the old fascination with wandering, with the new and surprising company of flightmates. And Fraser's Hill and Hong Kong...time to catch up with old friends and family, retracing old steps. Yep...the exchange programmes were the culmination of everything I had learned up till then, and the year-end trips were a fitting tribute to two years well spent in making new friends, exploring new places, all the while not losing track of old connections.
And everyday connections, too, were surprising. The brilliant, warm, sparky people of the Humanities Programme...it has been invigorating to work with such like-minded, yet such diverse, people. Even my own class, too, started to grow on me after a while, I must add. Good people they are, whatever else they may be. And not to forget the nicest CCA in JC, RJGE, with the kind of bonds and camaraderie that I thought I would never see after EDrama. The exhilarating feeling of being able to, collectively, make a mark with what we were doing.
And my old refuges of the old 4Ners and friends from secondary school. So many friendships from that period were continued that I am frankly rather stunned. I thought that it wouldn't be as easy to keep up with each other, but somehow things just happened so we could stay in contact. Some part of what we had is preserved; not everything has changed. And in many ways I think these two years are the fruits of the foundations and preparations made in secondary school. Then, I was learning; now, I put it into practice.
Like I was saying to YS yesterday, these two years were characterised by this kind of happiness, by the surprises that surpassed my expectations and taught me to hope for more. I think, really, this happiness is founded on a feeling of security, after all. While competition in school is undoubtedly fierce, the thing is that I don't feel, presently, that I have to fight for my position, or for my respect. Socially I feel safe among my friends and workmates. And from this foundation, on the brink of a new year filled with unknowns, I feel that I am ready to begin.
I don't know what to expect from this new year. Probably many things will not be the same. Hopefully I will continue to be surprised, and I can continue to learn. But from the vantage point of the end of 2005, I can begin to look forward to 2006 with anticipation and eagerness.
After the fireworks displays the people lining the banks started lighting up their own sparklers, and the boats started to run out to sea again, their lights blazing. From the Bridge people were showering sparklers on the boats as they passed underneath. It was rather pretty, these little lightshows that dotted the shoreline. If the fireworks were our collective hopes for the new year, then these little lights were individuals who were taking some of the hope with them. I don't want to sound too sentimental myself, but I have to say that I look towards the new year with hopes of my own. With these little lights it doesn't look so scary after all.
And an exhilarating new year to everyone! Things will change, obviously, but I believe not all at the same time. Some things we should keep from the old year I think. Keep in touch, yar? =)
