It’s just me.

First day of home team visit was to the various departments of SPF. First stop was the MHA. Haha.. it’s located such that you will have to jaywalk to get to the Police HQ. How ironic! Okie, then it was a monotonous speech by a senior officer. On came the director of recruitment department or the like, who came specially to mingle around with us. Basically the speeches and talks and videoclips and stuff are all directed at persuading you to take up their schlorships, potentially. So yea.. lots of goodie bags and freebies, presence of high ranking officers.. Several confirmed HUS scholars (CS) were with us too. And I just don’t feel right there. Really, was I supposed to be there in the first place..?

The next stop was the Traffic Police HQ. The same routine goes on.. talks, demonstrations, hands on, interesting QnA where questions never end..-_- Deputy commander of TP was gracious enough to host our visit personally.. so honoured! Had catered lunch there, chatted up with the few CS, gained much on what future’s gonna be like ie. tips and stuff.

Subsequent stops were the Toa Payoh NPC where this jovial sergeant hosted us, and then the Special Operations Command where the dashing commander’s answers was more often than not, “offical secrets.”

Today’s visits were to the SCDF departments, mainly the HQ and SCA. Sui Sen gathered for breakfast at Eunos.. that’s like super early..zZZ

As usual, talks, refreshments (they just kept feeding us!..argh), lunch, hands on, goodie bags, QnA. Had a chance to don on the oxygen mask, which is kinda kewl, i feel. Those fire simulations of real case scenarios were even more kewl! It’s really a rare experience.

And those guys… horny lah! Actually I noticed it since morning and I thought it wasn’t really improper, just sexually appealing, err..does that sound correct? Okies then she decided to clip her tag there which made things even more appealing and.. and the guys just blew it up lah. See, now we’re called “conservative twits”.. happy? -_-

We were dropped at Boon Lay after the day. Decicided to dine in at Pizza Hut after a very torough consideration cos we are a very democratic lot, you see XP

That’s when we started sharing our hobbies and interests, and Mark realised how attractive I was.. haha. Then we started playing ‘angel and mortal’. So the guys and gurls went on seperate ways to get their gifts. Quite coincidentally, we met outside X-Zone after that.. fortunately I wasn’t the last at the Daytona race mann.. haha. But sadly though, we could’ve seen Esther dance, if we’d been earlier.. =X

Yea, “the good times are always so short”. Back from OBS, learnt a great deal, had loads of fun, a changed person now. It’s amazing how strong a group can become, if its members could work together as one. We were such an incredible team, literally a team of leaders.. good followers, proactive, efficient, intellectual, mature, sociable, inquisitive, resilient. I have no doubt on the potential of these potential scholars.

Everyone had a great time, I believe. Nobody lost their temper despite the rigorous itinerary, no prejudice and discrimination, absolutely. Instead, the air was constantly filled with joy, laughter, and the sweet sweet taste of unbound friendship and team spirit, of course and the racist and dirty jokes too. Most of us have a common feel that we’re closer than with our own CTs, which is kinda true. The bonds forged over the last 3 days kinda made me ponder, what’s 05S6E? Quite nothing. I have no promising faith in it anymore, not that I had any high hopes on it before.. just disappointed to have a lifeless two years in the college.

There are no strangers in this world, just friends you haven’t met. There is no such thing as failure, just lessons haven’t learnt. I have learnt much from Dean, my peers, and the course objectives.

Trying and fail is better than failing to try. You only live once, so live life to the fullest and embrace whatever comes as best you can. I feel that Dean’s “Ok, Sure!” philosophy just sums it all.

A strectched mind will never shrink back to it’s original form, that’s how it is.

Whether I will be offered MHA’s provisional scholarship contract from this assessment is quite secondary (but crucial still lah). What’s more important is, I’ve grown.

Days 4, 5 and 6 left.

What a time!

Day 1
Recalling the very first morning when we assembled at Punggol MRT stat… total strangers. Then we began to self-intro. Didn’t get long to start up a good rapport before we board the boat at the jetty… got divided into 10 and 11. We’re ‘Sui Sen’!.. Mark aka Ahmad the joker, Feng, Kim, Qi, Sally, Joy, Sheila aka ChioBu, Yvonne, and Esther and I, who became learning buddies. Dean was our instructor.

We sat around.. set our group’s goals.. played the helium loop.. and competed against the Barkers in a trivial little activity. Well of course we won.. haha. Grabbed our stuff and left for trek soon after a catered lunch. Wao wao wao.. 4 checkpoints in 2 hours seems like a piece of cake, but trust me, it’s quite the opposite. Wondering around in the forest with a compass and map and straining our eyes to look for the camouflaged metal plates is no kidding okie. We only managed to find 3 even with a merged 10 man hunt. Like..-_-

Then we played this game where we’re supposed to orientate ourselves from a base tree to a home tree, blind folded! 1 hour of preparation didn’t seem enough, but we succeeded anyway.. =D

Somewhere along the way to the first campsite after dinner, we stopped to do some tunneling. Cool, the tunnel is pitch dark! Imagine crawling your way out in total darkness and a shut exit with no knobs. Yea we reached the end point without even knowing and went back in again.. haha. Confident Esther didn’t freak out, quite surprisingly, but she sounded just as childish in there.

Arrived at campsite 1 around midnight. Pitched our Barshas.. did some mass peeing and went to sleep.

Day2
Amazingly, no sandfly bites. Cleared the ‘Alpine Tower’ and set off to campsite 2 for breakfast. Got changed into wet activity attire.. did some briefing.. and off we went on a memorable kayaking expedition. We had many raft-ups aka mass resting sessions, where we socialise and sun bathe.

Our destination was half way round the island, near the fresh water quarry where we had a raft building competition. Well we won of course! The ‘Barkers’ came over to help us out in the last minutes. What a great sportsmanship!

Our way back was via the rivers cutting across the island. The tide was already rising and we had to race to get through the magrove swamp (maze) before water starts pulling out to sea again. Thanks to the instructors for their confidence in us. The last lap back to the jetty was a romantic row under the evening sun.. LoL. Seriously, we almost couldn’t live up our arms to paddle any further, esp Esther. But we did it anyways.. well done, lady! =D

Guys pitched the barsha while the girls cooked dinner. Steamy rice with curry chicken was on the menu..! Hmm.. the Barkers had raisin rice though(,”)…

Had a little group chat with Dean.. then some further ’stuff’ back in the tent before the hyper ones finally gave in to sleep. It was a leisurely night.

Day3
Trekked back to the main campsite, where we tasted the “damn good” water from the water cooler. Then it was the obstacle course, the course of which was kinda blurry in my memory cos we were running about trying to help out.. be it belaying or cheering the peeps on.. super tiring! Wee Leng is this one super girl I partnered with for ‘the pole’. Kim and I overcome the ‘zig zag’ thingy in lightning speed.. can? Haha.

Then it’s time for lunch. We said our ‘last words’ at the table. And it’s time to pack up, finally, sadly. Did some reflection.. wrote testimonial sort of thing… spoke another round of ‘last words’.. and we were off on a speed boat back to the mainland.

~evluation next entry~

3D OBS starts tomorrow. In any case, I must enjoy myself all right! Haiz.. revision ah.. hmm that can wait lah.. XP