Platoon Field Camp

Wow... It had being a very tiring week. On Monday morning, and I mean morning, at around 3.30am, we had a turn out. And this is my first time getting a turn out and it is a nightmare, really. During the turn out at that time, I feel like I had not woken up but instead, it is like in a bad dream.

During the turn out, we were punished of course. Push ups and crunches are expected. Down, Down, DOWN...! Didn't do proper push up right? Never mind, start from ZERO! DOWN, DOWN, DOWN...! Didn't do proper push up right? Never mind, start from ZERO! DOWN, DOWN, DOWN...! You all are tired rite?! Crunches position CHANGE! Push up position CHANGE! Crunches position CHANGE! UP, UP, UP...! (And it goes on and on and on. I didn't even know how long we had being doing that. But I know that my arms are breaking and I could not raise myself up the floor once I go down. The worst thing is they find small mistakes that we made such as we did not update the parade state board.)

Continued...
Why some of you are wearing long 4? Never mind, whole lot, I give you all 3mins to change to your PT kit... GO! (After we are back from changing, we were again punished and then...) I give you all 8mins to change to your long 4 and fall-in in the parade square in your full battle order... GO!

It is really shag. My arms were shivering as I change into my long 4. The worst thing is not yet started. The push ups were just a warm up for the day. After we fall in, we were once again punished for late. No matter how early we fall-in, we will definitely be punish, no doubt. Then, we went on and move to a field and did a deliberate ambush. It is kind of like a refresh of our memory. Then, here comes the peak of the day. Artillery bombing! One injured in his chest! What's next? Stretcher out and evacuate him. We ran all the way from the field, around discovery centre and back to Wing line. Along the way, we had a few more casualties. So how? No choice but to carry them back? one of them dead, so have to fireman lift him back! It is really shag. When I carried the stretcher on my shoulder, it really hurts and my back was almost injured. We took turns at certain intervals. By the time we reach Wing line, it is almost 8am. Our Wing Commander gave a de-brief on the importance of the day's turn out. It is to test our readiness.

That whole day after the turn out, we were all fighting the Z monster. Lecture was after the turn out. We were all trying to keep ourselves awake during lecture but in the end, alot fell asleep... Stand! Sit! Stand! Sit! Stand! Sit! This is what we get for sleeping. I hate it when he commanded us to do that as it really hurt my back. Can't remember what we did the whole day already. I am so sleepy that I could not think.

Then, next day will be our platoon field camp. It is a Marsiling. Marsiling?! It is so near to my house! True enough, it is. I can see my neighborhood from across the expressway, SLE. When we were moving from the place where we alight the bus to the training shed near the expressway, we were contacted quite a number of times. It is a standard training package we get. Platoon movement is so much difficult to control than a section size. And there are alot of running to do. The best thing is the reserve section who is not attacking will be the ones who are relaxing while others do their job. During this field camp, you will see all sorts of people with their mask off. And it is the time when you can see how the person will behave and react to impromptu situation. When they get nervous, they will tend to do things anxiously and never plan their man well. It is a time to test their ability to think under stress and pressure.

During the last light, we did our harboring drill. It is actually a simple drill. We had to set up our harboring area and stay in there for the 2 nights. We were supposed to take turns to sleep to guard our place; instead, everyone went to sleep. The next day is quite a relaxing day. We had to do the Operation-Order, Ops-Order, for the following day mission. In the afternoon, we went to do our NVG or something. Went to the enemy site to access the situation there. It is like doing a reccee. Then, we had to go back and do adjustment to our Operation of move and attack to the information we collected and present our final Order.

We had rehearsals on how we are going to attack too. By the time everything is finish, it is almost 12am. At 2am, we are supposed to move off for our mission at .85. We reach our Assembly Area, AA, which is around Mandai area or lower. All I know is we have to walk around 3-3.5km to reach our Form-Up-Area, FUP. It is quite a slow walk and we "hollanded" once. But lucky it is not too far. One of the obstacles we had to cross is the drain. It is filled with muddy water which is around above my knee. What does it mean? there are water in my boots and we cannot air our boots until we go back to Wing line.

There are 2 attacks. First is by the appointment holders for Ex-Zebra. The rest who don't have appointment would have to do the 2nd attack which is to breach through the concertina wires before attacking up the hill to the enemy (from Hotel Wing). The second battle is much more interesting and there are more fierce fire fights. I was sitting there on the slope watching them doing their movement and it seems like a real war. But those who went for the 2nd battle fight got very dirty as they did alot of proning.

I do not really know I should thank the person who got Att C till Wednesday or not. If he is there, I would be the dirty team who went for the second battle fight. But in the end, I felt it is better to be a appointment holder for the exercise.

When we went back to Wing line, we cleaned our equipment and after lunch clean arms. We even had a lecture and discussion session conducted by Wing Commander. It is also the time when we fight with Z monster. At night, we were scolded by our Assistant Platoon Commander, APC. It is because we did not spend more time to clean our arms and some of us are caught by one of the instructor for sleeping while we are suppose to clean the arms.

I think I am getting more and sicker of the instructors. Sometimes, they are so unreasonable. When we are doing our things, they did not take notice, but when we are not doing anything when instructions are given, they saw us slacking. It is always the case. Sometimes, I really wanted to punch those instructors on their face.

During the night, I drop dead and everyone should be too. I almost could not wake up in the morning. We do not have any 5BX, which is such a relieve. But a self accessed lecture at the computer room. Then, we had a GPMG theory retest. The first test was done atrociously and around more than 3/4 of the whole wing failed. Therefore, we had to take a retest and god sends us 2 wonderful instructors to take us. They "helped" us in the test as they told us that they know that we do not have the time to study for the test and if they did not "help" us, we will sure fail again. True! We do not have time to study. Worst of all, the retest paper is even difficult than the one we had during the first test. Even the multiple choice questions were so difficult.

After lunch, we went to Peng Kang hill and the FOFO site to access the enemy location and surroundings. It is so tiring climbing the 2 hills. Moreover, we had to march there from Wing line and back to Wing line. SOC is the next lesson. It is the 4th lesson and there is a run down. Because we just came back from field camp, our fitness level had dropped and the timing for my SOC is quite bad. I did 11.01mins, and it is my worst record. Haa...

After SOC, it is Happy Hour! Lt Teo from platoon 3 is leaving us and is going to 1SIR to be, don’t know a CO or ACO. Not too sure also. He reminds me of my poly lecture, Mr Goh. The way they speak is almost the same. At around 11pm, at last we are able to book out without any stand-by-area.

Oh it is already 1am in the Sunday morning. Yesterday, I went to Wannie's 21st Birthday BBQ at East Coast Park. There are Qiuhua, Cheryl, Yong Cheng, Webb, Sept, Jenson, Patuma and Wannie's Secondary school friends. It is a small birthday celebration but it is actually quite a nice way to celebrate. She invited alot of people. But quite a number of people are unable to attend. Anyway, Happy 21st Birthday to Wannie! It is the most important year for her. Every time people celebrate their 21st birthday, it reminds me of my 21st birthday which is so lonely in camp during my BMT days.

Yesterday I had wasted my whole morning and afternoon. I did nothing much at home, only using my computer to surf the net. Oh well, I had to get busy when I wake up later in the morning. Haa...

tata...