2008 has come and gone. Oh, scrap that. That sounds a little cliched and emo =p
But anyway, we indeed bid a farewell to 2008 ushered in the new year. As I enter the wrong side of twenty years old and await going to Uni it might actually be a good idea to take a step back and see what the heck 2008 meant to me; cliched, emo or not.
2008 marks my second year of National Service, still at 30 SCE of course. Thinking back about January and February reminds me of nothing else other than standby duty, having turned operational as a company back in December 2007. Since at the start of the year, Prasad and co were still trainees back at ETI, it meant that we were still short of specialists, which meant that Weiquan and I had to cover standby duty for other platoons. I eventually did a grand total of 14 weeks of standby duty before ORD, including getting activated for a grand total of 8 times, so it might take some time before someone beats my record (maybe William beat my record; I didn't count for him).
We went to Seletar Camp for our construction course in February, but what was supposed to be a fun six weeks got rudely interrupted by the escape of our dear MSK, who is probably counting down in a jungle somewhere now or something. I bet he must be feeling rather pleased with himself even though he could not manage to carry out any terrorist activity, for he singlehandedly destroyed several weekends for many males aged 18 and above. Still, I did feel a little pride in doing something real for the nation for once, rather than fighting imaginary enemies in dense jungle. We might not have gotten the man, but busting illegal immigrants counts as contributing to the nation too ;o
The latter part of the year was all outfield exercises as far as I can remember. It led to me feeling pretty jaded most of the time. Soon enough August came and we were off to Thailand for our summary exercise. It might have been a tiring two and half weeks there, but it was a great experience, interacting with the Thais, drinking as many flavours of freeze as we can, humming along to the Thai songs and National Anthem, watching Thai boys herd their cows... and not to mention, climbing the daunting Eagle Hill, only to realise that the climb down was the real daunting task. The entire trip there was most memorable. And I doubt I'll ever experience the kind of elation that I felt when the plane touched down in Singapore (:
After the climatic summary exericise my final months of my National Service was spent at the Advanced Engineer Specialist Course at Nee Soon Camp. Credit to the best trainee, but I still stand by my opinion that there were others who were worthy of that title too. I shall not speculate on why others didn't get the award, but I know we all did our best, and thinking for myself my best was definitely good enough. This isn't arrogance, this is confidence. I know I've achieved what I've set out to achieve.
Finally, some non-military things to talk about heh. ORD came in November of course, and after that was the Malaysia trip with my fellow specs, followed by a period of employment-seeking, and now I've finally settled down to work at Alexandra Hospital. Pay isn't much, but I like what I'm doing, and it's a good exposure prior to my studies (Pharmacy at NUS), so yeah. No complaints =)
Mid-2008 was the most emotional part of the year for me (except maybe for ORD lol, but that's happy emotion, so it's different). Maybe it was the string of outfield exercises making me incredibly jaded and more prone to mood swings, but in any case I've put things behind me now. I haven't got any regrets knowing you, and I haven't managed to find the root of all your troubles, but I hope you get over everything one day. I still wonder about your sudden "disappearance" after I returned from Thailand, I sometimes still miss hearing from you, and I'm still here if you need me, but maybe indefinitely not meeting up or even speaking to each other is for the best.
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kheng yong; 19th dec 88
[x] Ashley
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