10th November 2009.
Taking my last sip of fruit juice, I walked out of Tuas Naval Base, through the gate which I used to stand at.
My feeling was very complicated.
I thought I should be happy, now that army life has finally ended. But it turned out that I wasn't.
Or rather, there were too many good memories for me to leave this place with a smile.
There were hard times, but there were also good times spent with nice friends, and I would never forget some of them.
They say that army enables the boy to change into a man.
I'm not pretty sure whether I'm considered a man now.
What I'm sure of is, I definitely gained something through this 1 year and 10 months.
Now let me take this chance to look back at the times I spent in the SAF...
Basic Military Training
When I was enlisted, I was just like a student who had just started secondary school: I didn't know what to do. All I knew were the items to bring and the place to report. My mother accompanied me to Pulau Tekong on the first day. I still remember on that day we took MRT, and in the middle of the trip I had a stomache and had to get down the train to go to the washroom. My mum was very angry because we were running late already. After that we took a taxi to Pasir Ris Bus Interchange, but still couldn't reach in time. Fortunately, the SAF personnels there didn't say anything, and we still could board the bus to Tekong. Was it because my mum was around? I don't know.
Before I even knew it, my pink IC was gone. One guy had asked us to place it down on a table, and at that moment I had no idea I wouldn't be seeing it again until today. There was a lecture, and before that our company sergeant major spoke to us. It was the first time a military personnel actually gave us instructions. He had a very strict tone and was very stern. He even taught us how to sit properly! At that moment I thought, wow, this is no joke. Everybody is so serious about this. I got to be serious also...
I said goodbye to my mother right after the lecture. Very soon we were separated into our individual platoons and sections and given our rooms. It was such a coincidence, that there were 3 guys including me who were from Hwachong! That enabled me to get into the community faster(initially...). My bed buddy, Sam, was also very nice(initially...). And our section commander, Sergeant Au, was... a funny person. I mean, he tried to sound serious, and look serious, but on the inside he's very funny. Later on I'll realise that, almost all the commanders in the SAF are like that...
The beginning of BMT was quite tough. It's just like first day of school (did I mention this before?), you have to get used to the system. The accomodation and the food was okay, but the discipline was something that took me time to adapt to. I still remember the harsh punishment given to us by Mr Goh, my secondary school teacher, when I was secondary 1. He made us do things such as moving our tables to the grass field and touching the tree and coming back etc... Through BMT I was able to understand how all these came about...
And that's how my 9 weeks of BMT started. I was in the enhanced batch, hence my BMT duration was shorter than some of the people. I guess that's because I got Silver for my NAPFA and got PES A for my health screening. Very soon I was able to get used to the system, such as waking up early everyday, doing exercise every morning, and taking colder showers every night. But there was one thing I couldn't get used to even until the end: showing off.
Since I was in the enhanced batch, all of us were expected to go through commander course and become commanders after BMT. Therefore we were expected to display our abilities without any reservations. That's how I came to know about the word, "wayang", which basically means to show off. That's something which I didn't like to do, and wasn't used to doing. I didn't like to do things just to show others, even if you didn't know how to do, and showing enthusiasm even when I'm not interested. But what I didn't know was, in the army world, everybody had to do that.
Because of that, added on to the fact that I wasn't a good speaker and couldn't communicate well with the rest, I didn't make a good impression on others and my commanders. The only things they knew about me was my name and the fact that I knew how to play weiqi. I also fared badly for my SIT test, and my peer appraisal was also quite bad(though I didn't really know the results but that's how I think they turned out...). As a result, I didn't get into SISPEC or OCS, and only got a vocation known as Sea Soldier Leader...
I was also very hesistant about whether I wanted to become a commander. Initially I didn't want to become one, because I thought that if I became a commander I wouldn't have time competitions. That worry turned out to be redundant though, because in the end I also didn't qualify for any competitions... Anyway, nearing the end of BMT I changed my mind and decided that I want to become a commander. Being a commander, I would be able to learn how to give others instructions and how to manage people. I would also indirectly learn how to manage my time, and most important of all, commanders will get more money. Hence when they asked me whether I wanted to go command school, I said "Yes".
And my next phase of NS life started as a Sea Soldier Leader...
Sea Soldier Course
3 months of BMT has ended. Now I will move on to the next 3 months, when I went through the Sea Soldier Course(SSC).
Initially when I was made known of my vocation called Sea Soldier Leader, I didn't even know what it meant. What's a "Sea Soldier"? It sounded quite cool, but after that I found out that it was actually no other than guard duty... And a very "siong" kind of guard duty, unlike normal RPs. Basically we are RPs belonging to the Navy, but we do much more than other RPs.
Anyway, the 1st 2 weeks were spent in 2 PDF Camp at clementi doing some RP course. The first day was the worst... Suddenly the sergeants in charge of us told us that we had to stay in at Changi Naval Base(CNB), which was like damn far away. After the day's lessons they brought us there for dinner, and then because we didn't bring any of our stay-in materials, we had to get home from Changi and then come back with all the necessary stuff within 2 hours! Not considering the distance from my house, CNB is a place where there is almost no traffic. Other than the shuttle bus which comes once in a while, the only thing you can take is taxi, and you have to call one... In the end everybody was frantically calling cabs, and I also barely made it in time... That was sort of the worst experience I had...
So for the whole of the 2 weeks we were expected to go to Clementi Camp from Changi and then come back after the day's lessons are over... It sucked... However for the 2nd week we were allowed to go home because apparently the Warrant Officer from 2PDF went to talk to the boss of SSC. That was cool, but then why couldn't have released us from the very first day? Haiz...
One thing I was happy about is that I still had a chance to become a sergeant. The sergeant in charge of us that time told us that Being a Sea Soldier "Leader" is something like going to SISPEC, just that they already had too many people there hence they posted us here. Hence at the end of the course, if I performed well, I will have a chance to go through the Sea Soldier Leaders Course(SSLC) to become a sergeant. Apparently some others were just Sea Soldiers and not leaders. I actually believed what he said, and believed that I could become a sergeant. But most of the time, reality doesn't go the way you want...
SSC officially started after the 2 weeks RP course. Coincidentally, there was one Hwachong guy in my bunk again! Anyway, before it started many people said how "siong" SSC will be, but actually I didn't think of it that way. It's very demanding both physically and in the disciplinary aspect, but I actually liked it. All the physical exercises can help you keep fit, and all the while I liked discipline. What I meant is, I preferred a place with a lot of discipline than a place with none. That's why I didn't like my school days: there wasn't enough discipline! Students were doing what they want, and sometimes the teacher didn't do anything!
However, most of the people in SSC only knew how to complain how tiring it is, how demanding the sergeants are, but I didn't say a word. I just aimed to do what I was supposed to do. I was given 3 appointments, and I always carried out my duty without fail. When I was the Platoon IC, I also did my best and performed whatever the sergeants asked me to do. But there were no results. Or rather, the results showed that I still lacked something...
Yes, in the end, I wasn't selected to go for SSLC. To add on to it, I was the only Sea Soldier Leader who wasn't selected. Why? I kept asking myself. I did all that I was supposed to do, why wasn't I selected? Instead of me, some random people who couldn't even give proper commands got selected. My sec com told me that I was capable, just that I didn't like to do work with others, hence I wasn't recommended for SSLC. I guess my peer appraisal was very poor again. But at that moment, I only had anger and jealousy in my heart.
What I didn't realise was that, there are some things which are more important than capability and discipline. And that's human relationships. Especially in the army, it's very hard to succeed on your own. Since everyone like to complain so much, when they talk bad things about you, your reputation goes down, no matter how capable you are. The same also goes for relationship with your superiors. Just blindingly following their orders is not good enough. Sometimes you have to joke with them, and even lick their boots. And when you do things, you must do things so that others can see, unlike me whose efforts can never be seen. And that's why I didn't "suceed" in SSC.
But knowing that is not enough... It's just very hard for me to communicate with typical singaporeans. It has always been like that. They either make fun of me being born in China, make fun of my name (cos a lot of people have the surname Zhang...), or there are no common topics to talk about, making it very difficult for me to communicate with them. I could only talk to those who were very outgoing, but I was never the no. 1 friend of anyone. I think I should change myself, but that's very hard to achieve. Hence, how to improve this situation, is still unknown...
And that's how my SSC life ended. I had no regrets. Only hatred. Hatred for my sec com for not recommending me, and hatred for the others whom I didn't think were capable but were still selected for SSLC.
Tuas Defence Squadron(TDS)
My next phase, and the remaining phase of life in the army was spent at Tuas Defence Squadron(TDS), which is situated at Tuas Naval Base(TNB). Most of the sea soldiers were either posted to TNB or CNB, and luckily I was posted to Tuas, because Tuas was nearer to my house, even though it was still very inconvenient to go there. And at that time, the system at Tuas was better than that at Changi, as we were allowed to go home more frequently. Duty at Tuas also didn't require LBV, except for some stations. I thought "Wow, this is a nice place, I can enjoy my life here!", and it made my anger which I carried on from SSC soothe down a little.
Life at TDS started with being an OJT. We were supposed to follow our seniors there when they are doing duty and observe what they do. Luckily for me, my OJT was quite smooth. There weren't many turnouts, and the seniors were nice to us. After 3 to 4 weeks of OJT we started mounting duty officially. I was posted to platoon 1, with 4 others. There was a choice of going to land-side or sea-side, and I chose land-side. That was because at land-side we had to deal with more people and more situations, and I wanted to challenge myself. Life at sea-side even though is slack, I felt that it would be too boring to spend the rest of the time there.
Being only a man, initially I didn't like most of the sergeants. I thought of sergeants as those who only knew how to wayang. That's why my relationship with the sergeants were quite bad, especially the first batch. Also, because I was still a new bird, my duty was very "siong", hence I also didn't have the energy to go and improve relationship with others.
Things started to get better as the next few batches of sea soldiers came in. Well, actually there are things which got worse also, such as us having to wear LBV and the introduction of 7 days duty. But as you rise in seniority, your duty will get less "siong", so it was still okay. My relationship with the sergeants didn't change though, even when those from my batch became the platoon sergeant and guard commander. I could see that they also didn't like me, and they also tried to tekan me by giving me more duty. When that happened, I just took it without complaining. In fact I never liked to complain. I believed that complaining is a display of weakness, and it shows you can't achieve things on your own.
Well, but in life, you have to depend on others. There are times when I wanted to talk more to the rest, but I just couldn't bring myself to. Only when I became an old bird then the situation started to improve. Being a laojiao(old bird), I had my position and hence I could talk to the juniors more freely. Even though I had to stay-in for 7 days, I started to enjoy life there, by doing exercise, watching movies and playing PSP. Slowly those anger started to fade, and whether I was a sergeant or man didn't matter to me anymore. I had already accepted reality, and the fact that it was my fault. I didn't do enough.
Through TDS I also learnt how the whole Guard Duty system works, and how to deal with people. I never regretted choosing land-side. It also allowed me to observe people, and it was funny to see some trying to bluff us or smoke their way through by hiding something. It was even funnier even when we catch these people. Night duty was boring, but I also found my way to survive by finding things to do. As long as you never get caught, you can do anything. That's one "core value" in the SAF.
There were also many different situations, and it was interesting to see how my superiors deal with these situations. Some even involved high-ranking officers, and some even resulted in people getting extras or going DB. I also got extra twice, and when serving the extras I kept cursing my commanders, but after that I thought that actually it didn't matter, 'cos it was my fault that I got caught.
Time started to pass really fast with the introduction of 7 days, and in a blink of the eye my ORD was coming closer. The last few months at TDS was actually quite enjoyable. Duty was very little, and hence I could enjoy my PSP. I didn't manage to play finish a lot of games though. The duty system also turned for the better, with the introduction of Sea Troopers who shared our work load. In fact I think my batch of Sea Soldiers suffered the most. After we joined all the bad changes started coming in, and when we were about to leave all the good changes came in. But who cares. I was going to ORD already. However, surprisingly, for a moment I thought that spending more time here wasn't so bad...
After I came back from Thailand, it was already my clearance week, and I had almost nothing left to do except to get a few signatures. Got my ORD plaque and ORD cert last Friday, and got back my IC today. Suddenly sadness started sprouting within in. Oh, I'm about to leave this place. Even though I may be coming back again, but all those times, no matter good or bad, will never come back.
Conclusion
1 year and 10 months in the SAF.
Not long, not short.
I have to say, the time wasn't very well spent.
I wanted to achieve something, to learn something, to make myself a better person through this 1 year 10 months.
And it seems that I have failed.
I have never even visited the Chevrons ones! What a waste of membership...
However, I definitely have brought something home with me, other than my pink IC.
Something which cannot be expressed in words.
Something, which will definitely be useful to me in the future.
Something, which hopefully, can make me grow into a man.
Good bye TDS.
Good bye, friends.
Good bye, SAF.
Till the time we meet again!
PS I can't believe it took me 7 days to write all these...
