Archives

November 29, 2002

Gambling Training Wing

what a day... well, it's finally official : i've been posted to gunnery training wing at school. i guess what really rocks is the pple there. a really fun and whacky bunch of intructors that operate pretty much like a close knit family...

shan't say much now... save that it's been quite a day. the icing's that we've got a long weekend and i'm meeting up with the phylit pple tmr!

***

Zhi Gao Shu Zi Ji 'I Believe'
Yi Ding Hui You Jie Guo

Posted by zai at 11:47 PM | Comments (0)

November 28, 2002

ROSWELL!!!!

for all its inconsistencies and incredible lack of regard for logic... it is probably the only show that can drag me down to that special level of nostalgia and melancholy, somehow resonating with what's inside of me. time after time...

what can i say... it kept me company thru some of the darkest months in my life... gave me reason to keep believing in the magic. ah well... tonight will probably be the last time i'll get to watch it 'live', it's back to staying in for the weekdays from tmr onwards... time to start work again i guess...

***

Lifehouse - Everything

you are the light
that is leading me
to the place where
i find peace again
you are the strength
that keeps me walking
you are the hope
that keeps me trusting
you are the life to my soul

Posted by zai at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)

November 26, 2002

Back to school

two more days!!!! hahaha! *hysteric*. acutally, all this excitement in me really just hinges on that one announcement about my posting... i'll just K everyone if they tell me to wait until the ps course ends before telling me which wing i'm going to... =P gunnery or driving... the only sad thing is that there are three of us and we're going to split up... hai... into the hands of fate...

we got off really early from lessons again today... walking out of camp at 3:30pm is so my idea of heaven... damn the guys who get to do this everyday for their ns life... =P

***

find your place in the universe.

Posted by zai at 06:53 PM | Comments (0)

November 24, 2002

Closer

will be moving back to school of armour soon, ending two weeks of drifting around in someone else's land... can't wait to get back to a place where i know i belong. think it's just me, always needing a place to call home... in the end i guess i'm pretty much a feet-on-the-ground type of person. flying's good, if only for dreams... =)

can't wait for the Two Towers!!! harry porter was just a prelude... what with Gandalf the White and Aragon back in full force... fantasy never looked so good before... =P shall catch treasure planet before this course ends... another escapist-type show =)

*got 'we're in heaven' stuck in my head... argh!!!*

Posted by zai at 10:08 PM | Comments (0)

November 22, 2002

Spellbound

two words : Harry Porter.

it was just so charming and enchanting to watch the fantasies that you've been concocting up in your head materialise on the screen, played out by real life actors doing stuff you've been imagining since you were a child.

when immersed into a world of such richness and magic, you just can't escape the temptation of carving out a role for yourself in that world, with energy crackling from your hand and an aura of power surrounding you, a character you can outfit with all sorts of weapons and magical abilities. i guess what's so special abt that fantasy world is that you have control over your own destiny, to be who you always wanted to be, something that Life takes the liberty of deciding for you in the real world becuase sometimes things are just not within your control. live with it i guess.

Posted by zai at 01:25 AM | Comments (0)

November 20, 2002

No way...

10 signs that you're enjoying your NS life a little way too much ...

1) the only thing that makes you sweat the whole day is queuing up for food at the canteen.

2) endurance training runs have been reduced to a 10 min stroll from camp to the mrt station.

3) mental training comes in the form of resisting the temptation to take the bus in the morning when you could go for another enhanced endurance training stroll/walk/crawl.

4) you see the commanders/men of the host unit go for a 3.2km run and go '...so poor thing...'

5) you can finish listening to an entire music cd album during lunch break back in the bunk before having to fall in.

6) once all that filled your head was "vehicle hit! law 1 down!!", but now it's 'Alpha 6, hit! ship sunk!!'

7) people around you all have the same look on their faces that seem to say : is that all we're doing for today??

8) a good book replaces the jackknife as the essential survival item.

9) you start getting used to prata breakfast and a 45 min nap after you've entered the camp every morning before lessons start.

10) you're an attached personel and 40 SAR has a cross country run on a saturday (again). yaahhhooooo!!!

Posted by zai at 11:10 PM | Comments (0)

November 18, 2002

Which JC are you from?

*** the following passage was not written by me, it wasn't even written by my alter-ego, Gnaix Iaz, who usually delights in such endeavors. but then who wrote it? or more importantly, which JC did he come from?? ***

---------- z ----------

hi, i'm 3SG Cheng Zai Xiang from RJC. No, you don't need to know which battalion i come from or what my blood type is, RJC would suffice. I mean, unless you've been hiding inside an M113 for the past few decades, i think i can skip the part explaining what RJC stands for. (and just in case you're wondering what M113 stands for, well, it's a very nice aluminum-alloy box that rolls on tracks.)

You see, people from RJC are natural leaders, of the highest profile and ability, often seen in front of the pack doing whatever it is we do in the army. And when i say leaders, i don't just mean the section!-straight ahead!-hill!-charge!! type, but more of the company!-straight ahead!-hill!-charge!!! variety. we can't help it, it's the school we come from.

so leave the partying to ACJC, the studying to HCJC, the evangelising to SAJC, the population control to CJC and the 'ok lah, can't blame you' to PJC, cos RJC is too busy trying to stand out from the crowd by adding a few extra layers of shoe pads into our boots. hey, we are suppose to be 'the best', though a little 'selfish', with a penchant for all things green, black and white.

now, for the ex-students from the above mentioned schools who are about to club me to death with a 25mm cannon barrel, bet you all are just protesting at the ridiculous labels you've been pasted with, just because you come from a certain college. welcome to the family of traumatised a-level national servicemen suffering from constant prejudice and stigmatism imposed upon by our ever inquisitive superiors. (their favorite question being : which JC are you from?)

so here's my question : what's wrong with being low-key? what's wrong with standing in the crowd (as opposed to out from the crowd) and watching the world go by. the view isn't that great, especially if you're standing in the back row, but life's simpler when you can give blank looks instead of acting intelligent for the whole day. besides, i like working from ground up, rather than parachuting my way down. also, hands don't really talk as much as mouths do, so excuse me the next time you see me physically working on a problem instead of just talking abt it.

i enjoy being different, i love being the anti-thesis. i have my own style and way of doing things, my own set of ethics and values that i live my life with. these things i learn from my parents, pick up from people i admire and imitate from some movie stars. Individuals, not institutions, shape me.

but it's just too tedious to list out the names of everyone who has made an impact on my life, contributing to the attributes that define me. so, weakly i reply, "yes, i'm from RJC..."

---------- z ----------

Posted by zai at 08:59 PM | Comments (0)

November 15, 2002

Happy Thoughts

life somehow gets better... just found out that i've been linked by my web idol, sonia, from shinjite.net!!!! quote : *dies*!! she's like some webdesign-shen/queen/goddess who has been one of the most powerful inspiration for me in my webdesigning... cool... =)

and... bumped into my BMT sergeant on the way home at the mrt station... heh, i was like smiling to myself when i saw two recruits walking away in a hurry after seeing me, and then i caught the guy next to me smirking too... knew he had to be some nsf guy thinking the exact same thoughts as me... took me a while before i realised that he was sgt. lim =) has it been almost a year already? nay... i'm still too young to feel old =P

Posted by zai at 10:23 PM | Comments (0)

Banging my head

man... what a frustrating day... guess i'm just disappointed by other pple's attitude towards training... it's just not the same as my schooling days, where pple actually do stuff because they have the passion for it, be in choir or the bowling team. there are so many pple who just don't care abt the things that we're taught and just carry on with their own preoccupations...

i mean i'm not asking anyone to love the army to death, being a little more responsible and considerate would do just fine. realisation of the fact that each of our own actions, selfish or not, will somehow affect the whle course... like angering our course instructor today... bringing upon ourselves all that unpleasantness...

sigh... but of cos i am but just one person. am usually quite stoic towards these kind of things cos i can only do my part, can't change the world alone. but somehow i kinda lost it today... thanks in part to spending half the day trying to bang in the damn front wire mesh!!! haha... guess it's just hard to find pure dedication in a vocation that at times seems a little pointless. so thankful for the few who don't think it like that. =)

Posted by zai at 10:07 PM | Comments (0)

November 12, 2002

Sweet Home

arrived at 40 one hour before time, which happened yesterday, and on a hunch, will happen again tmr... had a good time sleeping at the vehicle shed for a large part of that hour before lessons started though, no regrets arriving so early.

walking around 40 without a bunk to go to reminded me of my jc days... like wandering abt the corridors before settling down at one of the wooden tables on the 3rd level... could have gone to my classroom, but it was too far away. could have crashed the grps of pple i knew in the canteen, but i needed a quieter place for the morning...

haven't felt this 'homeless' feeling for a while now...

anyway, went to watch 'sweet home alabama'. it was erm, ok lah... at least i managed to keep my vow of catching every single romantic comedy that comes out... the search for that one magical show continues...

list of shows to watch before our course ends... : Harry Porter, Blue Crush, Treasure Planet, Two Towers!!

couldn't help but notice that all the stayout personnel were wearing the army uniform while the 40 pple where in civi... =)

it's getting late... just glad to be back home again. i know i can beat that longing feeling as long as i keep busy...

Posted by zai at 11:16 PM | Comments (0)

November 10, 2002

Rainin

listening to the sound of rain pouring down, jumping to the beat of 'all i want for christmas' by mariah carey... just another one of those carefree moments that are so hard to come by...

went out with nick yesterday, and amazingly we didn't have to turn to the movies to occupy our time. just chatted and walked abt from ps to orch rd. happy to be with such company even if it's just the two of us.

can't believe i've still got one more night at home before i have to book in back to 40. wait... then again i'll be back every night for the next three weeks...

oh what a feeling... =)

Posted by zai at 01:44 PM | Comments (0)

November 08, 2002

Good Morning!

so much for goodbyes... i got to see every single one of my course mates the very next day =) bright, cheerful smiles being greeted in kind.

everyone was trading stories of their new experiences, esp the 40 pple... their first touch of unit life. the 'others' quickly become a grp of misfits that were still slowly appreciating their luck at getting any posting other than 40 sar.

really looking forward to this course, cos it's so slack! life starts after 5 actually... being able to stay out is simply heaven. got plans already : movies at $6.50! gonna catch harry porter for sure!!

comparing 'lifestyles' among 40 and non-40 pple isn't really going to work out cos... ah well... we belong to different places now... i just hope i don't get whacked too much by my section mates =P

met yanxiang!!! haha... he was doing guard this morning at 40, feels good to be greeted by a familiar face in an otherwise strange new world. hasn't changed since sispec... still using the same old phrases =)

Posted by zai at 11:43 PM | Comments (0)

November 07, 2002

What's Left

seeing a full lieutenant on the verge of breaking down isn't a nice sight... espcially if he's one person you respect the most. i felt it too... with handshakes and hugs... each knowing we'll be seeing less of each other... but treasuring the memories of the times we had spent together.

the company we enjoyed... the energy when we worked in tandem... the help in times of need...

well... the same forces that brought us together are sending us away this time. now it just takes a little more effort for each one of us, to remember.

Posted by zai at 11:30 PM | Comments (0)

The Beginning

and so there i was... standing on the grass patch behind the tonners, waving goodbye to everyone that was leaving for 40 SAR. focused right into one of the vehicles, hoping that any unspoken messages left in my heart, would be delivered through a smile and the wave of a hand to my section mates, platoon mates, course mates that i've mixed around with for the past 21 weeks... watched them go as the tonners pulled away from the parade square...

stood there for a while, feeling special and alone... looked around me and felt the emptiness of the wing line. glanced up my block and saw my two other fellow future instructors beckoning me to get my bags and book out. conceded. i made my way back up to get my belongings.

Posted by zai at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)

The End

bayonet. 2nd. instructor. 8 to 5 stay out. ps course...

instructor...

am just dizzy with the rush of dreams that have been coming true... didn't really want to contribute to all the rumours and talk that preceded this day cos it wouldn't be anything concrete... and so i just held my breath for as long as i could for this day to come...

and woah...

Posted by zai at 10:57 PM | Comments (0)