keeping in touch is very difficult.

I'm trying to start a birthday calendar. One that has the birth-dates for everyone reasonably close to me, including my friends and relatives. I realise that one prerequisite to maintaining your relationships (for at least a few years before it all gets snuffed out lah) is to at LEAST remember their birthdays and wish them...You don't have to buy a birthday gift for them...i'm certainly not going to buy a gift for EVERYONE and go bankrupt, at the most i'll share a gift or something...but even an sms goes a long way.

It's gonna be tough going though...my RI friends are beyond hope already (i think mark's having his bday soon..?) and i've lost my VJC class list..so i'm in deep trouble. My army friends...gone case liao, and as for the others...well i think jane's having her birthday soon..? She mentioned something about national day a very, very long time ago...i've got a whole bunch of Rodeo OG ppl who's birthdays're in October..but i'm not sure about the exact dates. My archives and house comm and rodeo OGLs...gone case liao. Maybe i should've asked kyrin and wenling/lihui and er...sheryl or yuen kay or simin to help me make those a long time over 'cos now i've got no idea how to get those numbers in without going to people 1 by 1.

And for some people i'll have to find out their birthdays without asking THEM because i think, in other people's dictionaries, it would be an absolute disrgace to forget in the first place. Pretty embarrassing when everybody remembers my 31st december birthday so easily and i don't even send them an sms on THEIR birthdays. I just can't remember the dates!! Haha even my closest buddies i forget too. Ahwell...gotta go now. Will post more later....maybe.

0 comments

well, and that's the end of my 9day holiday..

Haha ok not exactly 9 days but i'm booking in at 10pm today, and so that'll be the end of my...pretty long holiday. It's the start of 5-6day work week again. I managed to do some stuff over the weekend though, so at least the time was well spent. Managed to look at houses (my dad's thinking of moving after like 18 years living here) and went for karaoke, although we didn't get to play mahjong over the weekend.

Oh and i went for some singing class too! Had some pitching and tempo lessons that i passed without much trouble apparently. Haha somebody wants me to go S'pore Idol...although it would be much better if i could release a hit album while studying Law and skip all the competition hassle. Not that i've got much hope for a career of any sort..it's mostly all fun for me. S'pore...just too hard lah.

Hmm oh i just tried a slice of Japanese rock melon...it cost like 50bux or something. My aunt bought it from japan (errr like duh lol) and although $50 isn't the most that i've heard, it's still...like...woah. Sweet like heck...sorry ma...i'm afraid i can't eat all those other normal rock melon anymore. :D

Oh and guess what...i played only 2 games of dota this weekend! Amazing huh...so few but both of them were BEYOND GODLIKE...at least 20+kills each and less than 10 deaths. Queen of Pain's so fun to play..just stay that same lane and deny creep until you're like 4 levels higher than anyone else.

Ok, now i've got like 25 minutes of freedom left...gonna go take a shower! With some luck i'll be able to post more...on a weekday hehz. Well ciaoz!!

0 comments

Damndamndamni'mathomeandidon'tknowwhattodo.

Ok. I'm in a dilemma. You see, a pretty large part of my book-out time's spent at home, and home's supposed to be where all the fun is. It's been that way, at least, for the past..18 years or so. That should be about right. But at the moment..I've got nothing to do!

I've got a BIG problem. Since NS has started, whenever i'm at home i HAVE to do things that i can't do in camp. So although what i MOST want to do right now is read my books, i can't...'cos i can do that in camp! So why waste my book-out time? But then i'm not about to start any of the new comp games that i've acquired, simply because i don't want to get too into the game and waste my book-out time..in a sense i'm afraid to make a COMMITMENT to the game. And as for those which i've already started on, i'm already quite tired of playing them. I've got comp games that're highly rated, and yet i've stop playing them like after an hour or so because it just isn't FUN anymore.

TV's got pretty much NOTHING interesting going on, and as i just said, i don't feel like playing the computer, so all that's left to do at home is read my books, expecially when there's no one at home, a.k.a. no mahjong...but i CAN'T read my books and so yadayadayadayada...

I end up having to sit at the computer and play through 1 or 2 torturous hours of DotA with n00bs and leavers where i end up pleading to God for the game to end faster...I'm rather tempted to turn into a game leaver myself in order to accomplish this. Either that or i'd wander around the house trying to find entertainment.

Some of you might think that i've been playing too much, and that probably is the case. But somehow i just know that studying Law in advance or rereading my basic/advance driving theory books isn't going to help. I don't mind the studying, but it's gotta be...accompanied by some social involvement or the like...i think that's the only way to feel like my life's still moving forward.

You know you're in deep shit when you're on the computer, surfing random sites (and blogging too. woots.)and leaving the MSN messenger status as "Online" even during toilet breaks in a rather desperate hope that someone will chat you up. Even now, i can feel my precious leave time being eaten up in these wasteful activities, leave time that could've perhaps been better used for a vacation or a chalet...

I get the feeling that my life has pretty much stalled for now. And it's gonna take quite a bit of gas to get the engine up and running again.

0 comments

Haha i'm back!

Weeelll....the 5 of us managed to get permission to take leave for the next 3 days..which means i booked out on monday at 6pm and will book in at 10.30pm on thursday. Woohoo. I wasn't really eager to go on this 'lil holiday actually...like what's the point of skipping 3 days of slacking and playing around in the army labs (we FINISHED our modules after all) just to go home and do nothing?? Oh, and did i mention that we've got a FINITE number of leave to take and that i've just consumed 3 precious days of it?

I had 10.5days of leave..which's now cut down to 7.5. Which's..very good, actually. My fellow bunk mates had an average of like 5days of leave left to apply for...BEFORE they even took the 3 days. Weird...since we haven't had much difference in terms of leave taken...heck I've been booking out far more than them! All of 'em are OFF though...don't feel like explaining all this to you non-NS folks out there, but what's important is that it STILL doesn't explain how i've got so many days of leave still!! Lady luck must've been shining on me i guess. I mean...i don't know if there's any other reason. Lol.

Ahwell in any case...i don't know what to do. I must think of some way to make this 3 days meaningful...but how? Staying home and playing GTA/DotA is definitely out of the question, and so's watching TV, reading books and surfing the net. Trying to get laid/attached is just plain stupid, and i'm not about to go clubbing and try to get lucky. I also think that it's REALLY loser-ish to go back and visit VJC regularly and talk with the juniors like some extra-kia who doesn't know how to grow up. (Erm...not that i'm trying to implicate any...argh alright i AM trying to implicate someone. Woots.)

Trying to arrange an outing with my friends's also pretty difficult, not only because i suck at "outing management", but also because half my friends are in NS, and the other half...well it kinda feels weird going out with a bunch of girls and being the only guy around..? Like, i know SOME guys feel perfectly at home and all, but..lol ok i think that's enough for implicating. Maan...i miss the gossip-backstabbing days of VJ. I really do. I didn't even mind getting backstabbed myself. I mean, it's all in good fun...ok i'm being really random. Doh.

Damn. Maybe i should just sleep.

0 comments

A boring life and it's all my fault.

Well, the platoon's been split. 12 of the IS signal guys have gone off to 8 Signals Battalion, leaving 5 of us behind to follow the operator dudes around. The bunk's awful quiet now. I was the only guy from my own bunk left, so all my closer buds are gone. No more chatting about soccer late into the night, no more gossip, and it'll be hard arranging DotA matches like we used to do. Digimon fighting won't be the same again, as well.

I'm not the only one who misses all the action. That night when they had all gone, (last thursday) i was doing something dumb..like washing the mcflurry cup in the toilet to get rid of the..ant/rat attracting substances..then i heard weijie and alvin talking to each other from the shower stalls about how life's gonna be so boring with just the 5 of us. Alvin was like lamenting about how there'll be no more crap talk without michael and jason... (he was from the other bunk)

Alvin: "Hmm but luckily at least there's still Greg around..he's quite stupid lah."

dotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdot.

Me: (loudly)"Errr.....i'm in the toilet you know..."
Alvin: "Oh! Err..haha well...er...well i meant it in a good way lah."

dotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdot.

Man, i'm outta here. -.- Doh.

Lol but really! I don't know how i'll last next week man. I've got about 30minutes of freedom left..i wonder if that's enough time to arrange for some entertainment to bring over..? Like a portable dvd player or something?

In any case, i managed to do some stuff over the weekend. Watched Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest, ate dinner with my VJ gang and played mahjong. Played GTA: San Andreas also..so i got a chance to explore my nigga side..

Something's missing though. Like maybe i'm getting depressed again. 'Cos there really isn't anything to look forward to. I've played most of my computer games to death, and i don't feel in the mood to read or do stuff. I'm feeling lonely, even. Going clubbing sure as hell won't make life any better. Staying home would just make it worse. I think i need to start university. Or go to a chalet. (My friend's getting both done..he's going to a chalet for his Medicine orientation!!! Gaah..) Or get a fun job. Something other than the one i'm currently having...is there any way to get myself fired?

0 comments

Nobility will prevail. Sadly.

On the 7th of July, a thursday, we, sergeants-to-be and future commanders in the SAF, did saikang. We shifted huge steel lockers, tables, cleaned windows and bed frames, arranged chairs in the "entertainment room", swept the floors and took out the trash. All this on the Officer-Cadet-Trainee(OCT) floor. And not just for the OCTs, who are of the same age as us by the way, but for a particular OCT who was going over to Signals the next day. An OCT with a...particularly powerful father. I don't think i need to mention his name, do i?

It wasn't just the sergeants-to-be who had to do all this work. Every operator had to do their part, and there were warrant officers, people who've spent over 20 years as commanders in the Army, shifting beds around and going around unscrewing our locker door handles 'cos the OCTs did not have enough of them. Unscrewing door handles. An officer doing construction-worker-style stuff for no bonus pay. We even had to make sure the OCT's lockers had enough hooks to place their precious jockey-caps and berets...when almost all the beds in OUR own bunks have no hooks at all. (Not to mention the fact that our big mirror has been taken away...as well as our own bloody toilet door!!!)

It wasn't just yesterday. Word of the young prince's imminent arrival had spread over a month ago, and renovation work had begun since then. The particular floor was given a new coat of paint, mosquito nets were installed in the OCTs' bunks and new rust-free fans were installed. 10 fans to a room. In contrast, the sergeants and operators have 4 fans to a room, all rusty. And no way to block out insects that often fly in.

What makes me so pissed is that this normally wouldn't have been done for officers-to-be at all. Only for THIS particular batch for you-know-what-reason. As a senior officer whispered to us, normally there wouldn't any renovation at all, and no effort to wipe out the rat population before the OCTs arrived. Our OC apologised to us, as making sergeants-to-be do saikang wasn't his directive (although his sergeant probably couldn't refuse the officer who had sent him off to find man-power). "You know how it is", our OC told us. After all, what if that OCT had complained to his dad during dinner that the bunk conditions were horrible? Yes, what if?

Everybody i've talked to don't like what's happening, don't like this obvious show of favouritism and pulling strings, but most of them, including senior officers, also believe that there isn't really much choice. "Bo bian mah, he's his father's son after all." This's what disgusts me the most. WHY should it be "bo bian"?? Why should it be obvious to people that he should receive better treatment than the rest of us? Why are there so many people just craning their necks and taking all this crap simply because he obviously cannot be touched, that the world is unfair and "we have no choice"??

Is this something like our own Singaporean facination with our former colonial masters?? Is this favouritism for the supposedly more noble so inbred in our bones that we do it without thinking and even acknowledge it as a normal frame of mind?

It's really sad that you can be treated like a king simply for having the right parents. It's something like people getting treated better for HAVING lots of money, although they don't spend any more than the next guy. This particular OCT doesn't give SAF head honchos ANYTHING; he's just a normal 18 year old with normal grades like the rest of us (i don't know if he even plans to go into politics), but he still gets to have an easier life in BMT, OCS, and gets to go to an easy course in Signals and succeed in the army while doing less and having less hardships than everyone else. Simply because he has a father who MIGHT give the head honchos SOMETHING, however unlikely. It's not gonna help, you know...in the future he'd have a really myopic view on the hardships of NS life, which wouldn't be good for Singapore if he DID go into politics.

Other people have to sweat blood to get their officer rank. But he doesn't. And in the future, everyone except for those who were there when he was in NS would think he had gone through one of the toughest courses in NS. Whatever job he applies for, he'd be able to show off that rank to a lot of "Wow, he's such a talented person!" People will think that he had experienced hardship during his NS life. When he hadn't, actually. And that's really unfair.

I don't bear too much of a grudge to this particular OCT though, he probably doesn't have much of a choice except to accept the good treatment. His dad too; there's a good chance he doesn't even know what's going on. I definitely don't blame the poor warrant officers who had to make us do saikang as well. Rather, the blame lies with someone higher up, who just loves to lick other people's boots and get promoted.

But what can i say? As my friend says, the world is dark after all, and i'm just a corporal.

0 comments