just your average handsome boy next door

My Army Experience (i just edited it)

February 18, 2011 at 5:46 pm | Posted in General | 3 Comments

In spite of the title, this post will focus on what I took away from NS, what I learned and gained. Now that it’s all over (reservist is another story) I would say that it’s actually bearable and worth the experience, but to be perfectly honest it’s just about the worst two years of my life thus far. I’ll skim over the reasons why – i hate outfield, i hate authority, regimentation and discipline, i dislike many of the regulars, i hate spending so much time in camp (during the 1 year of stay-in, at least), i hate being lonely, i hate rushing to wait and waiting to rush, i hate the technical aspects of being a soldier, i hate stress, i hate the stupidity of the system at times. i hated not having a girlfriend to share my shit with. (i’m over it now though)

okay! that’s all. i’ll just continue adding when i think of more. but now let me elaborate on the positive stuff, because that is more important, and what i want to remember more.

1. Friends

Even though at this juncture i feel quite sad that we haven’t kept up the outings and meet-ups, I treasure the bonds that we formed, the time we spent together. The closest guys were of course the BSLC section 3 mates – Zu, Justin, Jiajun, Xinfu, Honchyte, Leslie, Ma, Nicky, Weisheng, Yongkang, Moses. We took awhile to gel, but subsequently spent the next few weekends clubbing together which was nice. Then field camp came and it was a stern test of our section camaraderie and morale, but i think it bonded us rather well going through all that shit together and encouraging one another, though there were a couple of episodes i’d rather not harp on. But there was one time during Grand Slam i was really damn touched, when i was totally dying and Justin, Zu and Leslie took turns trying their best to help me. The peak came at the last 2 weeks, when there was nothing much to do and the section spent 1/3 of the time sleeping and 2/3 talking cock. Yeah we talked till like late at night cos there was always nothing on in the day, only first aid course and lame things. Was really, really incredibly sad to have the section split up at the end of the 8 weeks – 4 to PTI, 1 to Signals, 1 to Armour Recce and the rest of us stuck in Infantry.

BMT was different. I took awhile to adjust to military life, so i was stuck in this funk for quite some time. I was quiet, reserved and completely shorn of confidence. Plus I didn’t know anyone except for Kaiming and Jiajun, and even then they weren’t exactly close to me in school. Plus I had a girlfriend then, so i spent the little spare time we have every night talking on the phone and not talking that much to the section. In the latter stages of BMT I began to open up and at the same time, appreciate the guys in Section 1. Unfortunately we’re not that fun a section (especially compared to BSLC Section 3) but it was damn fun bitching about the other guys with Lester, Karjun, Muz and Kaiming. Plus Jiajun, Leslie, and sometimes Shiwei these are the people who meet up occasionally after BMT… the bond isn’t super strong but i think there is something special about enlisting and starting a new chapter of life together with a bunch of people. (sounds like getting married, haha)

OOC life was shit because everyone only cared about themselves and evading the Saikang, but thankfully I had Jiajun, Moses and Kenneth sticking by me. There were some others who were quite nice but quite unfortunately I can’t remember most of them. I think I wouldn’t even be able to recognise some of them now. But it’s okay, because they were not among the important people in my NS life.

At Gombak Base I made pretty good friends like Ben, Mark, Simeon and to a slightly lesser extent, Warrant Tong, Keeboon, Adam, Weihao, the lifeguards past and present. I guess the rest can only be considered colleagues, or normal friends at the most. But generally the people at Gombak were really nice, likable people, as I would mention below. There are some pretty cute ladies working at MINDEF / CDC though. HAHA out of point sorry.

But I have to say the camaraderie and friendship were the strongest when us guys had to spend 24/5 together, chiongsua-ing, eating, bathing, sleeping, getting tekaned together. Talking to one another till or even after lights out is a memory I hold dear.

2. Meeting people from literally all walks of life

The people you meet in army is really, really diverse. Of course, the first, albeit minor, difference was having a good friend who isn’t Chinese. Muz and Zu, both Malays, were such instances. No offence, but the Malays i’ve met in army are generally a really friendly and funny bunch. And they make really loyal friends. And conversely, it might be a coincidence but nearly all the Indians i’ve met in army are annoying, self-centred and talk way too much, though they generally have good intentions. Btw please don’t slam me for this comment it’s just my personal experience and i mean to cause no harm or dissent lol. In any case i must mention that my sample size is not that huge so maybe it’s not a very fair gauge. Anyway it’s a good change from being in an all-Chinese school for 6 years.

More significantly, NS allowed me a chance to interact with people of the social stratum that JC students usually choose to ignore, consciously or not. At the risk of stereotyping, they include the poly students, the ITE students and even those who dropped out of high school. Out of the 6 storemen from my company in Sispec, 4 or 5 have been to DB / jail, and the remaining one was a violent time bomb waiting to explode. They told me they robbed, went AWOL, took drugs, got into fights. But after spending so much time with them, doing the same chores (it was after I went OOC), i realised they were all really nice people; loyal friends who would help you, talk to you, laugh with you. Some of them were really, really smart too. They are really not THAT different from us. So sometimes i wish society, including my future self, would give them a chance and not look at them with such tinted eyes.

Some of the guys who took a different route from us JC kids were really inspiring too. For instance, there was this regular whose family was poor, so he signed on. He married his childhood sweetheart early, his parents had poor health and his wife became pregnant halfway through B/ASLC. He only had a NITEC cert, had like less than 2k in his bank, and he had to support his entire family. There was one night where we were at the staircase having our supper, and he told me it didn’t matter that he had so little money, the most important thing was happiness, and being with his family, leading a stable life gives him that. Although i guess it helps that he’s a pious Christian, i don’t think many of us Singaporean high-flier-wannabes can boast such an attitude to life. I can’t do it, for one. Therefore i really respect him.

3. Putting up with the assholes

Tolerance is definitely a trait that i believe i’ve honed infinitely in NS. I can’t help that i was born with such a hostile, judgmental attitude with boundless capacity for dislike, as friends who’ve known me since JC or high school can testify. Just as i am quick to like and love, i am quick to pick on the negative side of people. Having said that, being an OOC soldier you get to see a lot of Chaokeng assholes. I don’t have a problem with people Chaokeng-ing, but i can’t stand it if your Chaokeng-ing implicates others, ie. making others do the work for you. I got a lot of that while at the Guardroom, and before that at the Coyline. There were also a lot of annoying people around, whom i wanted to name but forget it, let’s not rake up the past. I shall not harp too much on this point, but let’s just say that it really took a lot for me to not start a huge argument with them, to take a deep breath and let things go.

4. Cherish civilian life, freedom and the people around me

This is of course more relevant to my first year- stay-in, outfield, regimentation and rigour. In BMT it was really depressing… being away from home, family, friends and girlfriend, the tekan-ing from the commanders every single day (and night), the eternal rushing about, the stress and fear of making mistakes, the stupid chest injury, the discomfort from outfield, the inability to cope with route marches… bookout was way better than an orgasm to me. Even though i always arrived home in a bad mood from sheer tiredness and shouted at everybody, my family always understood and never complained or probed. They were probably damn worried too, for me. For that i was really grateful.

And i will never forget weekends in town then. Just seeing civilians in their bright, colourful clothes, even if they were ugly or shabbily dressed, was such a pleasure. Seeing, hearing the fairer sex around was also unbelievably nice and novel, that from being trapped on Pulau Penis for days at a go. It wasn’t only the freedom that tasted delicious, but also the lack of stress / commitments that were present during school days. But actually it was replaced by thoughts of the impending doom that was book-in every Sunday evening / night. Fortunately for me that ended prematurely for me, so i spent one good year being a stay-out soldier

5. EQ

After I got posted to Gombak Base in Feb 2010 life took a 180 degree turn for the better. Getting to stay out was one, but the best part was that the job was FREAKING SLACK lol. That didn’t mean there wasn’t room for screwing up though, because there were difficult superiors to work with. But as I found out, sucking up being nice, friendly and taking the time and trouble to engage everybody in a good and funny conversation every now and then have its benefits. To be fair to myself I did spend a lot of effort helping everyone and anyone who asked for aid. So after a few months in the Base day-to-day work got much easier because people were willing to help out or close an eye if I made a mistake. The atmosphere in the office also became much lighter (at least before my new S3 came in) once I got to know everybody and captured their liking Of course, part of the routine was sucking up, and that I think I did really well too LOL just ask my office guys. I make superb coffee btw, everybody says so. Anyway I think this is something I can take away from my NS, that working is much easier when everybody likes and cooperates with you. You also feel much less miserable and more motivated to work when the spirit is there, which is really important I think.

6. Dealing with stress

I think there’s not much to be elaborated upon for this one… and I guess it’s not just limited to army. More like a kind of personal development from say, primary school to JC, to army. From exams to standing on stage, there were a lot of stress factors last time. But I think Grand Slam during BSLC ranks as once of my most stressful moments in life to date. I still don’t know why I was so unfortunate to kena Sec Comm for the main field camp in BSLC, but it was a nightmare. 8540359 things to do, 6782956 instructions to pass on to 13 people scattered around a vegetated area, one shellscrape to dig (on super hard uneven ground with mega tree roots), asshole instructors walking around tekaning us and me for not being tactical enough… and it went on and on. Anyway the point was, at the end of Grand Slam we had to rank our section mates on various attributes, and I peeped at Zu’s sheet and he put me first for leadership!!! From Zu somemore, so i was really pleasantly surprised and extremely elated, because I didn’t think that I deserved that. My stress management had always been rather bad. In any case, that was a defining moment in my admittedly short time as a chiongsua infanteer. Occasionally at Gombak I would get bored and feel adventurous and garang, but I know the grass was always sweeter on the other side so i should just be content with my lucky job at Gombak.

Edit: 7. Dealing with independence

Something just reminded me of this point, something I’ve wanted to surface since eons ago but didn’t. This independence I’m talking about is not the physical, literal part. It’s more of… dealing with the ever-constant feeling that you’re alone, despite the hoards of army mates around you. A few months ago I was so bored I watched the whole series of Every Singaporean Son on Youtube. In one of the episodes with the cute girlfriend, there were comments along the lines of girlfriends not knowing anything about NS and not willing to listen to their boyfriends spill their sad stories. The army boys spend so much time in camp that they rarely are acquainted with the real world, or many other things for the matter. The girls spend all their time in school, at work, with other friends. So boy and girl end up not having anything in common to talk about, and the emotional distance sets in to compound the physical distance already in between. Of course when one party is more willing to listen, to empathise and be involved, the relationship would be more sustainable. But it is easier said than done, of course, so it seldom happens.

8. Health and Fitness

I have never stayed sick-free for so long till I enlisted. Easy to see why – healthier diet, plenty of exercise and early nights. All rather hard to achieve when we were busy mugging for A’s in JC. Anyway I copy and paste from my end-of-2010 reflection post:

year 2010 also saw myself being more conscious of my fitness levels… i’m really quite surprised at how much more hardworking i’ve become, haha. after i OOCed from ASLC i didn’t really exercise much. with the late nights, cup noodles and skipped meals, dirty bunk / bed / pillows, i found myself feeling sick-ish often. but because of certain unknown factors, the inertia level during that OOC period was at an almighty high and it was impossible to motivate myself to do anything active. so when i got posted to Gombak and realised that we’re the ones conducting IPPT for servicemen, i wanted very much to hit that elusive Gold that’s till now is still 5 seconds short. so i started running, pretty frequently for my standards i must add. even though till now i still haven’t gotten that Gold (i’m shit that way, hahaha), i realised i like the feeling of feeling fit… but i haven’t been running lately because i want to build more mass and i thought it might be counter-productive to run so much. since September i’ve also been taking mass gainers and doing more weights and abs exercises at home, a short half hour to an hour’s worth of light workout every two to three days. still can’t see much improvement physically but i really like this kind of lifestyle. when i start working and schooling after i hope i can maintain this routine. Plus i sleep significantly much earlier every night… Which is lovely. even though what spurred me on at the start with this whole thing was that i have too much time to spare and i’m not gonna have that kind of time when i start work / school… haha.

So I can safely thank NS because, in one way or another, I’ve actually become more conscious of these things.

8. Conclusion

So in spite of all the shit the SAF put me through (which of course pales in comparison to what most other chiongsua soldiers went through) I might actually be grateful for the experience… The technicalities and skills would all be forgotten sooner or later, but I hope these soft skills, life lessons would stick with me always. To be honest I wanted to dedicate a portion of this post to delving into why I didn’t make it into OCS, which would have meant an entirely different (and definitely more glamorous, though much tougher) NS experience. But since I don’t know why and would never know why (Sit test second day CMI, IPPT nearly but no Gold, zero leadership potential because i didn’t volunteer to be Platoon IC, too quiet, died during all the route marches, what else???) I guess I should really stop thinking about it. In the end I’m just glad to have had my own unique NS experience; though I must say I wouldn’t want to go through it again.

Yeah if you read everything tell me pls you can be my Silver friend for a week, unless you’re already one. And i foresee new thoughts will strike me soon so I’ll probably continue updating this post, because the primary purpose of this blog is for myself to read years down the road, as opposed to what most might think (= to AA only)