Blog
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Conversations #2
[SHAO YUN is outside the 3DIV auditorium with his mom after a parent engagement regarding EX CLAYMORE.]
INT. 3DIV AUDITORIUM – EVENING
FADE IN:
Shao enters the frame, holding his mother by the hand. He notices HIM ushering people about, hesitates, and approaches HIM to give HIM a poke on the stomach.
SHAO
Hello!
HIM
Hey! Not having any refreshments?
SHAO performs an amazing internal struggle at the sheer excitement of being replied to.
SHAO (yelling softly)
THIS IS MY MUM BUT SHE KEEPS CALLING HERSELF MY SISTER
SHAO breaks into a hurried trot as he drags his mother off-screen. A distant audience laughs at his antics.
QUICK-CUT:
INT. BUS – EVENING
SHAO is sitting next to his mother, and slaps his face after a pause. The exact same audience laughs and applauds his foolishness as the scene fades out.
FADE OUT.
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Twenty
This date begs for a blogpost commemoration, and my mind unspools unevenly in response.
I had blissful day out with friends that were separated for slightly too long. Nothing had soured nor aged, and everything will be good in retrospect.
I don’t have much time to say enough now, and when this goes live, I’ll be laying, as spread-eagled as the too-small bunk-bed would allow, writhing in sweat and discomfort.
There’s so much I could write about; the sorrow at my head’s largesse; the broken earphone jack; the shirt I always wanted to get; the primal glee a trampoline park provides or many other things.
Add something new to that list: the incandescent smile, with beautifully creased eyes, and the wave I received a few hours ago. Made me blush for ages.
I’m twenty and I feel no different!
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Taboo
“No more drinks after this, alright?”
I gave a sheepish grin and a thumbs up, before sinking my face in the bottle my other hand grasped.
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Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked
It’s been a real long time since my last blog post; opening a new post always results in a new draft being made, wlth my attention being rapidly drawn to the other 49 tabs I have opened.
First off; I’ve recently moved back to Jurong Camp from Seletar Camp, having “graduated” from a 6-week construction course where I learnt how to construct a “modular kit” (a toilet) while learning about piping, concrete laying, wiring and building a structure for the kit itself. This means I take an hour and a half more to travel home now in addition to all the guard duties and ARFs I’ll be undertaking.
I’ve changed from a sad sack who’s constantly worrying about relationships to a hot-headed asshole who is quick to offend and finds fault everywhere. I find it less easy to empathise with, and past friendships seem to mean less which I feel ashamed of. I take turns to hate people and not talk to them for weeks on end (my record was 6 weeks) and self-reflection to “change” often boils down to nothing. And I often ask myself (and others) why I work so hard just to get no recognition.
I’m constantly tired of how relatively weak I am; I’ve passed my IPPT at long last, but the many others in my company have obtained Silver. I’m still overweight and maybe moreso than last time (actually no).
Uh, so a set of lyrics.
I can’t slow down, I can’t hold back
Well you know, I wish I could
There ain’t no rest for the wicked
Until we close our eyes for good -
Instructions For A Bad Day
“There will be bad days.
Be calm. Loosen your grip, opening each palm slowly now. Let go.
Be confident. Know that now is only a moment, and that if today is as bad as it gets, understand that by tomorrow, today will have ended.
Be gracious. Accept each extended hand offered, to pull you back from the somewhere you cannot escape.
Be diligent. Scrape the gray sky clean. Realize every dark cloud is a smoke screen meant to blind us from the truth, and the truth is whether we see them or not – the sun and moon are still there and always there is light.
Be forthright. Despite your instinct to say “it’s alright, I’m okay” – be honest. Say how you feel without fear or guilt, without remorse or complexity.
Be lucid in your explanation, be sterling in your oppose. If you think for one second no one knows what you’ve been going through; be accepting of the fact that you are wrong, that the long drawn and heavy breaths of despair have at times been felt by everyone – that pain is part of the human condition and that alone makes you a legion. We hungry underdogs, we risers with dawn, we dissmisser’s of odds, we blesser’s of on – we will station ourselves to the calm.
We will hold ourselves to the steady, be ready player one. Life is going to come at you armed with hard times and tough choices, your voice is your weapon, your thoughts ammunition – there are no free extra men, be aware that as the instant now passes, it exists now as then.
So be a mirror reflecting yourself back, and remembering the times when you thought all of this was too hard and you’d never make it through. Remember the times you could have pressed quit – but you hit continue.
Be forgiving. Living with the burden of anger, is not living. Giving your focus to wrath will leave your entire self absent of what you need. Love and hate are beasts and the one that grows is the one you feed.
Be persistent. Be the weed growing through the cracks in the cement, beautiful – because it doesn’t know it’s not supposed to grow there.
Be resolute. Declare what you accept as true in a way that envisions the resolve with which you accept it.
If you are having a good day, be considerate. A simple smile could be the first-aid kit that someone has been looking for. If you believe with absolute honesty that you are doing everything you can – do more.
There will be bad days, times when the world weighs on you for so long it leaves you looking for an easy way out. There will be moments when the drought of joy seems unending. Instances spent pretending that everything is alright when it clearly is not, check your blind spot. See that love is still there, be patient. Every nightmare has a beginning, but every bad day has an end.
Ignore what others have called you. I am calling you friend. Make us comprehend the urgency of your crisis. Silence left to its own devices, breed’s silence. So speak and be heard.
One word after the next, express yourself and put your life in the context – if you find that no one is listening, be loud. Make noise. Stand in poise and be open.
Hope in these situations is not enough and you will need someone to lean on. In the unlikely event that you have no one, look again. Everyone is blessed with the ability to listen. The deaf will hear you with their eyes. The blind will see you with their hands. Let your heart fill their news-stands, Let them read all about it.
Admit to the bad days, the impossible nights. Listen to the insights of those who have been there, but come back. They will tell you; you can stack misery, you can pack disappear you can even wear your sorrow – but come tomorrow you must change your clothes.
Everyone knows pain. We are not meant to carry it forever. We were never meant to hold it so closely, so be certain in the belief that what pain belongs to now will belong soon to then. That when someone asks you how was your day, realize that for some of us – it’s the only way we know how to say, be calm.
Loosen your grip, opening each palm, slowly now – let go.”
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Conversations #1
“You smell like my ex.”
“Wait, you have an ex?”
The 12 fans we had in the bunk did not stop the air from being heavy and warm.
I lounged next to Jonathan, eyes drifting about in boredom. I’d known Jon since the Field Camp during the BMT phase; I fell out during the second day of my company’s Field Camp and ended up joining Cougar in theirs, where I met him.
“Yeah, I do.”
His boyish face made me doubt the existence of his current girlfriend in the first place. The fans hummed, people turned in their beds and the heat still hung about. The washing machine beeped, signifying the end of another cycle.
A little conversation was made about that ex of his before I raised my phone up to check on my Clash of Clans.
“Well,” I changed the subject, “Maybe it was the soap I used. And I just remembered,” (I had asked him this several times before) “You thought I was gay the first time you saw me?”
“Um, yeah.” He made it sound like the most obvious thing in the world.
Attempting to conceal all concern from my voice, I mumbled, “Why the hell?”
“Probably the aura you gave, I suppose.”
“Ha! Heh.”
Oh, the heavy air, the damned heavy air.
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Still Clueless
I haven’t written anything on this thing for some time. I spent the last 10 minutes thinking of how to explain why, but it’s pointless so never mind.
The New Year! 2014 was supposed to be promising. But it’s been bleak. Plenty of introspective journeys while doing absolutely boring things, ranging from MRT rides to spacing out during conflicts. I’ve worked hard last year for damned weeks and yet others with more “prominent” achievements get recognised. Result? I’ve become an absolute slob. A shortcut-seeking sod looking for an exit for everything I’ve been doing. I’ve become an elitist who downplays the achievements of others whenever convenient. I’ve become one real hot-headed douche who cares not about others. Swears flow, excuses are made, tempers rise. I’m bloody damned aware that I’ve become worse and I’m bloody damned aware that I won’t give a rat’s ass in the future, but I’m a worse person so to speak. Can’t allow that to happen. I’m working on it.
Chinese New Year! I am no longer in need of convincing that I cannot hold my liquor. A single shot is too much.
Next. They’ve made me do something about my fitness. I run and do statics whenever they want me to. Fair enough! I’m losing weight slowly again; hope I can find the strength I used to have back in J1.
I’m learning more about myself. I hope I’m wrong about some things.
holy fuck I’m gonna be 20 this year. DAMN IM OLD
Also, I’ve become happier ever since entering this goddamn hellhole where everyone’s a weird-ass mofo, (myself included so the part above where I said I’m elitist doesn’t apply here) which in all honesty scares me to shit. Perhaps the complete change in environment makes it easier to distance myself from all the sadness I’ve used to have. It’s making me much more brutish though (I’m talking throwing cement-grade biscuits at people’s faces out of pure anger), which I definitely detest about myself.
Finally, I think it’s time to revamp my about-me and maybe even the whole concept of this blog altogether. I’m interested in Web design again, but it’s a little daunting. I should start with a website. Man, in retrospect, my design skills sucked.
Maybe I’ll write something more fluent next time when it’s not 1:35am.
*Note: the above post may have sounded super vague, but I’m trying to not mention anything specific about my “job” now. Don’t want to think about it.
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Why I Should Not Be Throwing My Jockey Cap; An Essay
ABSTRACT
On 240913, approximately 1730H, Sergeant JT and Sergeant Wilson caught PTE ABC (henceforth referred to as ‘my buddy’ or ‘Mike’) and I tossing our JOCKEY CAPS at each other while Sergeant JT was giving out instructions. Finding both the acts of tossing the JOCKEY CAP, as well as not paying attention to Sergeant JT at the time disrespectful, Sergeant Wilson handed Mike and me the task of writing essays about this act.
ESSAY
The JOCKEY CAP, better known in other countries as a patrol cap, is the first type of headwear Singaporean soldiers will receive during National Service. This essay will seek to discuss why it is inappropriate to toss the JOCKEY CAP around, namely through the symbolism of the JOCKEY CAP, the very act of tossing the cap like it were a “soft, green rock”[1] and the inappropriate moment when it was thrown.
The JOCKEY CAP has had a great presence in military history; the earliest form of military cap that resembles the modern patrol cap would be the Hungarian shako in the 1800s[2], followed by the French kepi in the 1830s before evolving to the softer kepi we have today. As such, the cap holds great significance as part of our No. 4 uniform. Tossing the JOCKEY CAP around would have the same effect as, for instance, using our No. 4 uniform as a tablecloth; both would be greatly disrespectful to the S.A.F.’s identity. Additionally, the semi-irregular shape and weight distribution of the cap would make it even more susceptible to landing on the ground once tossed, yet another sign of disregard for the Army. The JOCKEY CAP is much more than a mere piece of headwear; it is the trainee’s topper, a symbol of the soldier in the field, and should not be subject to idle tossing as if it were merely a ball.
Another problem with throwing the JOCKEY CAP around would be the act of tossing the cap itself. The motives for tossing an item can be seen in many ways; out of boredom, out of playfulness, et cetera. However, none of these motives are appropriate excuses; boredom, playfulness would all signify a lack of discipline. Moreover, if an F.A.D. were tossed instead, the reaction would be of indifference at most. The act of tossing the JOCKEY CAP may very well be a subconscious thought of perhaps tossing off one’s identity as a soldier. Outlandish theories aside, it can be understood that it was a foolish act to be tossing such an important and symbolic item to the modern soldier.
The final significant problem, which is probably the strongest argument against throwing the JOCKEY CAP, would be the inappropriate situation when which it was thrown. Similar to the age-old question “If a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound?”, if the cap was exclusively thrown about in the relative privacy of the bunks upstairs, the problem would not exist. However, against all common sense, this act of tomfoolery was performed in full view of several sergeants and was disrespectful towards Sergeant JT. This shows disregard for upper ranks, which violates the core values of Professionalism and Discipline. Not hearing Sergeant JT’s instructions properly may cause us to fall-in afterwards at the wrong moment, wasting time for everyone within the company when it could’ve been avoided by paying attention at the right moments. Even worse: if extremely important information had been handed down (for instance, the proper way to activate a mini-shrike), the neglect of such information may very well lead to disastrous consequences during live firings or war-time.
Ultimately, the act of tossing a JOCKEY CAP may be seen as an innocent thing to do, but as it leads to inattentiveness and thus to negligence and ignorance, it may result in much more than an angry sergeant. It is neither the JOCKEY CAP nor the tossing, but the lack of discipline and attention that is the issue. Thus, the act of tossing of the JOCKEY CAP in itself is not only inherently wrong; it was also performed at the wrong time and wrong place.
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Near Miss
Sometimes I get this feeling that, well, everything is dandy and fine, because I forget and I forget the reasons why things plague me.
2 days ago, I met a fairly close friend of mine at the bus stop below my block, where I found him smoking a stick in a bid to prove to himself -and me- that he was in such a deep pickle that it was absolutely necessary to light up (again) to solve his problems.
I considered calling him a dumbass and leaving right there and then… until he lifted his sleeves. The cuts on his arms dug into my mind, and I mentally slapped myself for being a callous prick; the kind which I would call all the guys around me, the self-absorbed men I swore to never become, the kind which I prided myself to not be.
I told him to get help, the kind I never got, and replied in a frustration… a frustration that I had sensed from those trying to help my pessimistic self. I’m sorry and I really am.
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Things change, my friends, and I’m nearly giving up… it’s too much damned work to keep anything the same any more, and I can find my wide-eyed hopefulness slipping through my fingers like the finest of sand.
But I’m too good for that, I tell myself. The days still pass, and I try to remind myself that “being myself” is simply… a matter of being the best me I can be.