Went back to Changi Airbase for the whole of last week for my ICT, the very first of 10 cycles to go through before I am permanently free from my national duties.
Going in, I had mixed feelings even though I was finally able to see my army friends again, the thought of having to travel all the way to Changi Airbase every day for a week pretty much ruined everything.
When I reported to camp on the first day, I thought the moment I walked into the first security checkpoint, the place I always dreaded to get assigned to for guard duty, I would get struck by a wave of nostalgia, that wave never came.
Going back to camp that day didn't feel any different from booking in when I was still a conscripted soldier assigned to that airbase to do guard duty, everything felt so routine, like that year and a half after I ORD never happened, that was until the soles of my boots started to wither away and began falling apart as I made my way through the car park area to get into the airbase did I realize that year and a half did happened and the boots I was wearing were showing signs of that. I was no longer a conscripted soldier, I was now reporting as an ICT, and as a first time ICT, I decided, against my will of course, that I would leave behind a trial of my broken soles, which were slowing breaking apart and falling off as I walked further into the camp, that walk became a limp as the soles of my boots started wearing off and become more and more uneven.
I had thought it was pure bad luck that that happened to me, but fortunately for me, I didn't have to go through that embarrassing and uncomfortable ordeal alone because two of my friends also had the same thing happen to them, their boots started breaking apart when we were all gathered in the auditorium, so it wasn't that embarrassing for them as it was for me. We all decided since wearing that broken and pathetic excuse for a pair of army boots wasn't going to work, we had to go get new ones, I mean mine was collecting twigs and small rocks on the ground due to the leftover sticky residue of what remained of my soles, a majority of it I had ripped off and thrown in the bin and theirs just looked like clown shoes with the constant slapping action it was doing when they were walking, so we got new ones at the eMart.
Going back to camp that day didn't feel any different from booking in when I was still a conscripted soldier assigned to that airbase to do guard duty, everything felt so routine, like that year and a half after I ORD never happened, that was until the soles of my boots started to wither away and began falling apart as I made my way through the car park area to get into the airbase did I realize that year and a half did happened and the boots I was wearing were showing signs of that. I was no longer a conscripted soldier, I was now reporting as an ICT, and as a first time ICT, I decided, against my will of course, that I would leave behind a trial of my broken soles, which were slowing breaking apart and falling off as I walked further into the camp, that walk became a limp as the soles of my boots started wearing off and become more and more uneven.
I had thought it was pure bad luck that that happened to me, but fortunately for me, I didn't have to go through that embarrassing and uncomfortable ordeal alone because two of my friends also had the same thing happen to them, their boots started breaking apart when we were all gathered in the auditorium, so it wasn't that embarrassing for them as it was for me. We all decided since wearing that broken and pathetic excuse for a pair of army boots wasn't going to work, we had to go get new ones, I mean mine was collecting twigs and small rocks on the ground due to the leftover sticky residue of what remained of my soles, a majority of it I had ripped off and thrown in the bin and theirs just looked like clown shoes with the constant slapping action it was doing when they were walking, so we got new ones at the eMart.
We managed to spend more than half of our credits on the first day from getting army boots, and we weren't the only one, when we got back from lunch, I saw boots soles just laying around the auditorium where we were gathered earlier in the morning, there were whole soles and they were small bits and pieces of them, all just scattered across the room.
There really wasn't much going on on the first day really and I don't think I can blog about the activities that happened because they actually told us not to, the second day was also quite straightforward, the first two days were covering the basic army stuff, just some refresher courses nothing significant , we spend more time waiting for things to happen than actually have anything happen, just like the third day where we spend literally the entire first half of the day waiting for lunch time to come so we can head to the NEWater Plant in the afternoon after we had our lunch.
The third day was suppose to be IPPT day, but because no one actually bothered to train up their bodies, myself included, the commanders allowed us to give it a miss and many of us just ended up waiting in the crew room for 5 hours.
After 5 hours of doing absolutely nothing productive in the crew room, we went to have our lunch before making our way to the car park area to wait for the bus that was indented for us to bring us to the NEWater Plant, that bus was over an hour late, so we were left waiting at the car park with absolutely no updates about the bus, a whole hour we just stood around the car park area and waited until finally the commander who was in-charge of us finally got some information from somewhere and told us the bus would arrive in 10 minutes, after almost an hour of us just standing around.
When we finally reached the NEWater Plant, which had a really really long drive way, the guide decided it would be best he did a quick tour because we were an hour late and he was suppose to be showing us the place 45 minutes ago, plus he knew we were going to be released for home straight after the tour so none of us really wanted to be there.
The whole group of us were all very disinterested during the tour, the questions the guide asked no one bothered to answer, asked if we had any questions, no one had any and the moment the tour ended, everyone just bolted out of the plant and made their way home. A few guys drove there so they were able to get out of the plant fairly quickly, but I didn't drive, my friends didn't drive and we weren't really comfortable asking people we hardly knew to drive us out of the plant, so we just walked out, and it was a really long walk out, that ended day 3.
Day 4 was pretty straightforward, a final briefing in the morning, quick lunch, another really short briefing in the afternoon and we were released. That was also the first day I booked out in my army uniform, the first few days I either booked out in my civilian outfit or took a cab home, which was cheaper than I thought, but I was too lazy to change that day so I just fuck all and went home in the army uniform, after having to take a 20 minutes ride to the nearest MRT station and another 50 minutes to get from Tampinese Station to Clementi Station, I really couldn't be bothered about how i came across, if someone wanted to STOMP me for sitting down, than so be it, they are going to get flak from Stompers in the comment section for doing that on STOMP anyways, so I just sat down during my final bus ride home. No one really cared.
Day 5 was the final day of my ICT. We were to report to Tampinese Safra for our cohesion session, I live in Bukit Timah so I didn't look forward to the cohesion, but thankfully I had a direct bus and because I was too lazy to switch to the train and then take a bus again despite it being a faster journey, I just sat in the direct bus for almost 2 hours to reach the place, I'm just grateful my motion sickness did not kick in.
The main event for the cohesion was bowling, at first I wasn't really that keen but after a few throws, it got fun, then my fingers started to hurt and it stopped being fun, after the third game, everyone's finger got sore and that was when we had enough, even up till now, my fingers are still sore and for some reason, so are my wrist, the soreness on my butt cheek was unexpected though, maybe from the long bus ride, so anyways, we just sat around until lunch was served.
After the lunch was a movie screening, they had to screen a movie to kill time because they couldn't release us too early, so while everyone was watching the movie, two of my friends and I decided to go play DOTA 2 at the LAN shop nearby, I haven't played DOTA 2 in a while, I have difficulty finding MOBAs enjoyable because I was never a good DOTA 2 player, so even though it wasn't really a great option, I decided to join them anyway since they would actually be playing by my side, they could offer me advice and instructions on what I should do.
Played a match with another bunch of ICTs, my team having 4 members and theirs having 3 because I'm the 4th member and the fourth member is a complete noob, in fact, having me play against them would be an advantage for them because they can just feed off of me.
Throughout the game, I did nothing to help my team, the whole time I was just sticking to a friend, and when I got killed, I just started walking back and forth choosing which friend to go to, and while everyone was hitting level 20-ish on their characters, I was still stuck at level 8, the highest level I reached was only 13 and that was after 45 minutes of playing, it was pathetic. I was literally spoon fed information on what to get and where to go to by my friends, despite having their strategies typed out in the team chat, they chose typing over speaking so the other team can't eavesdrop of our strategy, of course being the noob that I am, I still didn't really get it and they had look over to my screen and point at the mini map to let me know exactly where I had to go.
The only reason why I wasn't getting raged on is because my team mates are my friends, had this been an actual online match, my team mates would have ripped me to shreds on the voice and team chat.
We played for 45 minutes, made our way back to the gathering spot where the movie was being played and after that, a short debrief and everyone was released, that was the end of the ICT. It feels so weird because the 5 days felt like a really badly planned school camp (minus the sleepover), especially the last 3 days, because we had so many down times, it didn't really feel like ICT and had I actually been working in a proper company and not for my Dad, the 5 days would have felt like a much needed break, but at the end of the day, I still had to travel a lot back and forth from Bukit Timah to Changi so that kind of ruined everything.
My Mum was able to drive me 3 out of the 5 days so that was great, but going home everyday from there was a long and arduous journey. I just hope by the time I get called back again, I would have already gotten my car license because the biggest complaint I have is the distance and the IPPT but the latter was cancelled so it was alright, with a license and my parent's car, distance will no longer be an issue. I bitched and moaned about it to my friend prior to the start of my ICT, complaining mainly about the distance and travelling time, but really, looking back now, it wasn't so bad, it would've been better had more of my friends been called up, but it's better than not having any.
When we finally reached the NEWater Plant, which had a really really long drive way, the guide decided it would be best he did a quick tour because we were an hour late and he was suppose to be showing us the place 45 minutes ago, plus he knew we were going to be released for home straight after the tour so none of us really wanted to be there.
The whole group of us were all very disinterested during the tour, the questions the guide asked no one bothered to answer, asked if we had any questions, no one had any and the moment the tour ended, everyone just bolted out of the plant and made their way home. A few guys drove there so they were able to get out of the plant fairly quickly, but I didn't drive, my friends didn't drive and we weren't really comfortable asking people we hardly knew to drive us out of the plant, so we just walked out, and it was a really long walk out, that ended day 3.
Day 4 was pretty straightforward, a final briefing in the morning, quick lunch, another really short briefing in the afternoon and we were released. That was also the first day I booked out in my army uniform, the first few days I either booked out in my civilian outfit or took a cab home, which was cheaper than I thought, but I was too lazy to change that day so I just fuck all and went home in the army uniform, after having to take a 20 minutes ride to the nearest MRT station and another 50 minutes to get from Tampinese Station to Clementi Station, I really couldn't be bothered about how i came across, if someone wanted to STOMP me for sitting down, than so be it, they are going to get flak from Stompers in the comment section for doing that on STOMP anyways, so I just sat down during my final bus ride home. No one really cared.
Day 5 was the final day of my ICT. We were to report to Tampinese Safra for our cohesion session, I live in Bukit Timah so I didn't look forward to the cohesion, but thankfully I had a direct bus and because I was too lazy to switch to the train and then take a bus again despite it being a faster journey, I just sat in the direct bus for almost 2 hours to reach the place, I'm just grateful my motion sickness did not kick in.
The main event for the cohesion was bowling, at first I wasn't really that keen but after a few throws, it got fun, then my fingers started to hurt and it stopped being fun, after the third game, everyone's finger got sore and that was when we had enough, even up till now, my fingers are still sore and for some reason, so are my wrist, the soreness on my butt cheek was unexpected though, maybe from the long bus ride, so anyways, we just sat around until lunch was served.
After the lunch was a movie screening, they had to screen a movie to kill time because they couldn't release us too early, so while everyone was watching the movie, two of my friends and I decided to go play DOTA 2 at the LAN shop nearby, I haven't played DOTA 2 in a while, I have difficulty finding MOBAs enjoyable because I was never a good DOTA 2 player, so even though it wasn't really a great option, I decided to join them anyway since they would actually be playing by my side, they could offer me advice and instructions on what I should do.
Played a match with another bunch of ICTs, my team having 4 members and theirs having 3 because I'm the 4th member and the fourth member is a complete noob, in fact, having me play against them would be an advantage for them because they can just feed off of me.
Throughout the game, I did nothing to help my team, the whole time I was just sticking to a friend, and when I got killed, I just started walking back and forth choosing which friend to go to, and while everyone was hitting level 20-ish on their characters, I was still stuck at level 8, the highest level I reached was only 13 and that was after 45 minutes of playing, it was pathetic. I was literally spoon fed information on what to get and where to go to by my friends, despite having their strategies typed out in the team chat, they chose typing over speaking so the other team can't eavesdrop of our strategy, of course being the noob that I am, I still didn't really get it and they had look over to my screen and point at the mini map to let me know exactly where I had to go.
The only reason why I wasn't getting raged on is because my team mates are my friends, had this been an actual online match, my team mates would have ripped me to shreds on the voice and team chat.
We played for 45 minutes, made our way back to the gathering spot where the movie was being played and after that, a short debrief and everyone was released, that was the end of the ICT. It feels so weird because the 5 days felt like a really badly planned school camp (minus the sleepover), especially the last 3 days, because we had so many down times, it didn't really feel like ICT and had I actually been working in a proper company and not for my Dad, the 5 days would have felt like a much needed break, but at the end of the day, I still had to travel a lot back and forth from Bukit Timah to Changi so that kind of ruined everything.
My Mum was able to drive me 3 out of the 5 days so that was great, but going home everyday from there was a long and arduous journey. I just hope by the time I get called back again, I would have already gotten my car license because the biggest complaint I have is the distance and the IPPT but the latter was cancelled so it was alright, with a license and my parent's car, distance will no longer be an issue. I bitched and moaned about it to my friend prior to the start of my ICT, complaining mainly about the distance and travelling time, but really, looking back now, it wasn't so bad, it would've been better had more of my friends been called up, but it's better than not having any.
