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Basic training camp for j1s

That was what it was supposed to be.

But as with all odac camps, we'll learn from it, be it whether we're teaching or doing the actual learning. In this case, we were the ones teaching, but i must say we still learned a lot from this camp. Here are my learning points which i would like to share with everyone, and hopefully people will read and learn frm it.

Lesson 1: Always prepare ahead. By this, i'm referring to my camping bag. It is never sufficient to just prepare ur bag early in the morning before u leave the hse. never do that, no matter how experienced u r, because u r still bound to leave smthing out in ur hurry. i've been to like 10 plus camps in the past 5 yrs alrdy, and so if i can't quickly pack my bag early in the morning before i leave for sch without leaving stuff out, i doubt anyone of u can. Thankfully, the stuff i left out(whistle, poncho, daypack) weren't that impt.

Lesson 2: Be realistic. If u r fit and experienced, pls do take note that others may not be as fit and experienced as u r. In this case, i was referring to the j1s. Me and petrina planned out our skills rotation route according to my recce timings with gerard and meiting. And the j1s kinda cldn't keep up with the timings. they were like 3-5 mins late for each station, simply because their walking speeds are 3-5 mins slower than us when we recced the route. As much as i asked the grp leaders to hurry the j1s, i forgot to take into acct that some of the j1s mayb really weak in terms of fitness. (Oh well, those wun make it into odac through selection, but that's not the main point here) Thankfully again, the skills trainings still kinda ended smoothly, without that much delay.

Lesson 3: Remain contactable. Basically, charge up ur hp b4 the camp so u remain contactable, especially when u're an ic(me skills ic) and ppl hav to contact u to ask stuff. If ur hp is out of batt, it's troublesome. Thankfully yet again, pet's hp had batt throughout.

Lesson 4: Drink loads of water, and eat less. I drank a serious hell lot of water this camp. And i'm damn proud of myself. usually ppl say if u're sick, dun go for camp. stay home and nurse urself back to health. i just trashed and crushed that saying. totally. i went into the camp on friday with a sore throat that was worsening by the minute. by night time, my voice totally disappeared le. but i drank like siao. and it paid off. next morning(sat morning), i barely just had enuff voice to lead the j1s through their morning PT. however, my voice recovered enuff to do skills training briefing and debrief later in the day. and my voice is more or less back today. i can talk and my parents wld never realised i ever had a sore throat. woot.
On the other point, i shld eat less. i ate like siao on day 2 dinner. which is qte stupid, cuz u're gonna hav loads to shit out the next day.

there r also other many other lessons learned, but if i listed them all here, this blog post might not finish. lol. so i shall stop here. and start doing smthing gen hates. narrate what happened at the camp. haha. oh well, sorry gen! anyway, if any of u were wondering how i spent my time wif meiting( wah lao this is all thanks to just talking cock wif lz lah), i hardly interacted wif her throughout the whole camp. really. i think the person i was closest to was pet(petrina) lor. cuz we were fellow skills ics, so me and her were more or less put into stuff together, even if it was not skills stuff. another person i got to know much better wld be ryan d. and of cuz as usual my eoy ex in aus buddy, kevin.

Anyway, so yeah. left sch on friday, 3.50pm. had toyed arnd chem lect before that,before deciding that i shall not sit through the first 15 mins of it. After all my previous ri friends had came in and went "yong sheng what the hell are u doing here". so we went down to rgs to collect 16 spars(poles) for our camp stuff. Also lugged along almost all the camp logistics. so that the non-advanced party wun hav much to carry. Reached campsite at arnd 5? dunno the time lah, but arnd there lah. met tpjc odac who were leaving that area. chope the campsite and set up our tents and stuff. and had dinner which was food we took away frm changi village. and then abt half of us(the advance party) went off to meet the j1s and the non-advance party j2s. and they started their first activity of the camp, night orienteering. it was abt 9 at that time and it was getting damn dark. so it will be qte fun. haha. but i cldn't join them cuz i was among those assigned to guard the campsite. So i basically had 4 hrs to waste with nothing to do. so i used the remainder of my hp batt to sms ppl. eh and i clarify k. i did sms chinny. or at least tried to. basically it somehow cldn't send to him. it just kept going error and ask me to retry. so i gave up. so i sms other ppl instead. whee. and my hp ran out of batt and died. lol. so now i'm uncontactable. didn't think much of it(cuz i wasn't very impt at that pt in time), until tmr when i realised how gg that was. anyway, so nothing much for the remainder of the day. waited for j1s to come back at arnd 1. then had debrief and went to slp.

When i woke up the next morning at 5 plus, i checked my voice. omg it's like really gone. but a while later, it kinda recovered bit by bit, and soon it was better than last night alrdy. by 6 plus, when i had to lead the j1s for morning pt, my voice had just barely made it to the pt that that the j1s cld hear. anyway, with that kind of voice, it's not advisable leading all the j1s alone, so i asked gavan to help. then finished morning pt and my voice was much better le. so i cld actually brief the j1s abt their skills training! omg i just cldn't believe it at that time lah. and this was when the trouble began. With the skills trainings now underway, ppl confused abt how it would be run, where the stations r, or watsoever, started calling. and it didn't take them long to figure out that my hp is like switched off, uncontactable. thankfully, pet's hp had batt, and so i just stuck to pet throughout the whole of skills training. took 2 bikes and biked arnd the diff stations to ensure the smooth running of the whole program and giv last min instructions to the grp leaders. Went somewhat smoothly, then the j1s went off for interactions with the villagers, while me and pet cycled back to campsite and settled the logistics stuff. then left campsite with some other j2s to our respective stations for the station games coming up. had gavan, ryan d and angie at the station wif me. gavan had brought his ipod along so he and ryan d just kept singing their hearts/lungs/watever out while listening to the ipod. damn little grps made it to our lang hut station lah. so i actually had damn a lot of time to slp at the hut. yay. haha. after that, station games ended, then the 4 of us made our way back to campsite. we had dinner after that, at qte an early time, as we wanted to hav campfire after that. oh and it had rained halfway through station games so my tent was like flooded cuz some joker had left the zip open and didn't bother to cover the tent with the flysheet. zai.anyway, it rained halfway through dinner again, so the poor j1s didn't really get to cook a proper dinner. the j2s still did, cuz we had a tarp. but the poor j1s didn't hav. so we cooked qte a bit of food for the j1s, since we had qte a lot of food anyway. n i ate like a lot still. freak. and it was while cooking that i sustained three burn marks on my hand. basically it happened cuz one of our stoves ran out of gas, so i had to remove the gas head so i cld change the gas canister. and while removing the gas head, i accidentally allowed the gas head metal part to touch my hand. just a split second, cuz the reaction i made after that(dropping the gas head to the ground) immediately moved the gas head frm my hand to the ground le. but that split second was enuff to cause three scaring burn marks on my hand le. right now the three marks r like black. qte disgusting to hav black skin like that. lol. no racist pun intended hor. anyway, how it can cause that in jus that split second can easily be told frm the fact that the gas head had fizzled and sizzled upon touching my hand in that split second. like how the iron wld fizzle and sizzle when u drop water onto it. and the gas head did that on my hand. ownage.

anyway, after dinner, we had campfire.(omg omg we managed to get the wet firewood to burn) the performances put up had damn a lot of sexual connotations in them so i shall not elaborate here. like omg lah. so after campfire , we had solo night walk for the j1s. which was nothing much lah. not fun considering we j2s dun get to walk ourselves. lol. so after that debrief and went to slp again.

And i skipped my sentry duty(no point lah the sky cloudy. will be very sian when u can't see stars in the sky). anyway it wasn't my fault. cuz the previous time slot sentry is supposed to wake me up for sentry, but i bet he cldn't find me. cuz i moved over to the teachers' tent after mine flooded. haha. and so woke up and 5.30 and had our breakfast and prepared to giv the j1s a surprise.woke the j1s up at 6, got them to start their breakfast at 6.30 and told the they hav until 7 to finish their breakfast. then we interrupted them at 6.45 and tell them to evacuate immediately. meaning stop breakfast, strike tents, pack up and leave campsite by 7. this is supposed to be their emergency exercise part one. then they wld leave for merbah hut at 7, then begin a nature walk and finish their breakfast at the quarry. the view there is supposed to be magnificent lah, but i didn't follow the j1s. i stayed behind with some others to clear up the campsite and then got ready to leave. the j1s in the meantime are supposed to start their emergency exercise part 2. that is, that they hav found casualties( acted by the j2s) and are supposed to bring them to the bball court bseide the jetty. so then we met them there, and the left ubin.

and that was the end of btc 2007. sad, but still it's over and we can't turn it back. but still, i've learned a lot frm this camp and i'll rmb the lessons. while i may not hav gotten to know any j1(which is damn sad), at least i'll leave this camp more prepared for any future outdoor experience. =)


and i missed the taopok they gave willy(our camp commandant) at the end. damn. haha.

freaking hell, i hav 144 mosquito bites(yes i counted) all over my body. 70 on right leg, 44 on left leg, 18 on left arm, 12 on right arm. freak i'm itching like siao. if every bite drains 3 ml of my blood, i wld hav lost like half a litre of blood le. oh man, let's just assume i've just taken part in a blood donation drive okay?