Caught "Ah boys to men 2" late last night with my bball friends. The movie did indeed capture the essence of army experience in BMT, the common issues of BGF maintenance and camaraderie of the recruits in the army. The smokers gang and what's not etc..
While watching the movie, flashbacks of my personal experience played like a movie in my head. I remember volunteering to be IC during field camp, a situation nobody wanted to be in. Being IC just before the tekan session was especially tough for me, not so much due to the physical requirements, more because i didn't understand why we were getting punished over the most insignificant and trivial matters.
The discomfort from not being able to shower and getting pumped in the heat, holding myself in the push-up position while my platoon mates came over to fall in and my platoon sergeant shouting in my ears was the traditional way to get tekan-ed, and to be honest, it did affect me physically and mentally. I was literally in the push-up position in SBO for 10mins while my platoon was being lectured...
Then the handing out the family's letter to us came with the explanation of why they did this "drill". It was pretty emotional. The movie did depict that scene really well...
My friend asked me if I cried. I said no, but I clearly remember that I teared silently when I saw my granny's handwriting.
PS: she very rarely wrote/spoke in mandarin, due to her command of the language...
And there was the time at coy line when I acted "hero". Someone shouted vulgarities at the sergeants from their bunks and the sergeants heard it. Of course, we all were made to fall in immediately to 'fess up. No one dared to own up for it, and everyone would definitely get punished together if the culprit didn't own up. To be honest, when I "owned up" for what I didn't do, I wasn't trying to be hero or whatever. I had an inkling that I would not be punished as severely as my bunk mate as he had already "been marked", and also because of the fact that I was performing quite well so far and the commanders had a good impression of me. No point everyone suffer if I could take the "minimum damage".
In the end the commanders found out it wasn't me who did it, and didn't punish the culprit as well. I got a chiding from my sect comd lol~ I guess we (the entire platoon) got lucky hah..
But guess what, I'd do the same thing again if I'm faced with the same situation.
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Sometimes I think I'm too selfless. On the other hand I think that's how I really matured in the army. My unit experience also gave me a different perspective of the army, but I'd have to say that the BMT experience was the most enriching part of my NS time.
I don't like to talk much about my bmt "achievements" (2nd pick for platoon best) cause I don't want people to think that I'm being a hypocrite, acting gung-ho and all despite being a pes C (chao keng) soldier...I'm just playing my part as a fellow BMT soldier IMO..
I've to admit that the 2 years spent in the army has been reformative, despite my numerous ramblings about it then haha~
PS: my bun-koping buddy will not be likely to see this post, but I'd like to let him know that that rendezvous was definitely the most exciting and hilarious moment I had in my army days... ^^
The good old times... :')
Signing off,
-CPL(NS) Khai =]
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