想不开

晚餐两人份，你不在。
King Size双人床，你不爱。
无聊的客厅有谁人知？
只有将一切往心里塞。

想说“嗨”却说成“拜”，
无奈地任由你逍遥在外。
我还记得你要的咖啡，
两颗糖，不加奶。

但是眼泪还是掉下来，
突然一切变得很精彩。
我知道这样做不应该，
可是脑袋不自觉空白。

每天的报纸我照样买，
在新闻里我把自己埋。
我知道这样做不应该，
可是偶尔我也想不开。

苹果派、热牛奶，
我准备的菜你不再青睐。
现在的你只喜欢外带，
我想，却不敢一切重来。

想说“嗨”却说成“拜”，
无奈地任由你逍遥在外。
你还记得我要的咖啡，
几颗糖，要么奶？

但是眼泪还是掉下来，
突然一切变得很精彩。
我知道这样做不应该，
可是脑袋不自觉空白。

每天的报纸我照样买，
在新闻里我把自己埋。
我知道这样做不应该，
可是偶尔我也想不开。

后记：很久没有写写中文的东西了，没想到一写就写了一首仿佛是没有旋律的词。看官若有谁愿为这首散文诗谱曲，笔者不胜感激！

Billboard Top 100!

Actions and Consequences

It's called cause and effect. All courses of actions will have their correspnding consequences. Some called it karma. Forgiveness begets forgiveness. Kindness begets kindness. Hatred breeds hatred. Revenge breeds revenge.

What you do, it will be passed on. What goes around comes around.

Some people just enver be ableto comprehend this fact. Their actions seem to be done out of reflex rather than through careful and thorough considerations. To put it crudely and colloquially, their thoughts don't pass through their brains before being carried out. They fail to realise the possible impacts their decisions and actions will have on those who surround them, and sometimes, even on themselves.

I understand that some people are merely doing their job. however, they need not always follow the books. Between professionalism and appeasement, I think the latter would ensure a more successful and smooth-sailing career/time in the army.

In the army where people live with each other, where people see each other almost on the daily basis, where the platoon is tightly-bonded, where the community is closely-knitted, being a people's person is important. Going by the books all the time will never earn you respect. You have to be flexible, know how to bend the rules -- but of course not to extreme and ridiculous extend -- so that people will like you.

Gaining popularity is your first step of gaining respect.

You can be "anal" for all you want. Your men under your charge most probably would still follow your orders. But would you be bale to garner their loyalty and their respect?

You can argue that by being "anal" and follow strictly by the books, you are merely doing your job, but are you sure that at the end of the day, your job will be well done?

"Anal" begets "anal". It will come back to haunt you. Your inflexibility will come back to haunt you.

Don't pretend to be so idealistic and self-righteous. That's just naive. most of us are after all NSFs. We are all in this together -- performing our mandatory two years duty of National Service -- so why make it hard for everybody? Afterall, there's this much you can progess and climb up during your two years stint in the army. You are just a serviceman. At the end of this two-year journey, it's all back to equal.

And when you start university, it is when all your past sins will come back to haunt you.

Cause and effect. Karma.

Ifs

If I had not covered up my seizure experience and tick "No" to "Have you ever had a history of seizure?" when filling up the mandatory online questionaire prior to my pre-enlistment checkup, I would have downgraded myself from the current PES A to PES C.

If I had not dreamt of going to Officer Cadet School (OCS) and aspired to become a high-ranking Officer (and earn big bucks), I would not have covered up my histroy of seizure.

If I was not disillusioned and appalled by the behaviours of the Officers in my BMT company, I would not have tick "No" to "Do you wish to become an Officer?" during the express of interest.

If I had (somehow) entered OCS, I would be able to enjoy the prestige and respect people have for Officers. Even if I ended up becoming a Specialist, I still get to enjoy some sort of prestge and respect, though not as much as what the Officers are entitled to.

If I had known that my clearance is high enough for me to enter Air Force, I would have indicated interest in command school, for I know my life as a commander would be in the good hands of the Air Force.

But "if" is a word upon which history pivots into hypothesis. What happened happened.

I never regret my decision of becoming a lowly, humble corporal.

The Grass Is Greener On The Other Side?

I am starting to hate it when people start comparing how "chao keng" or "garung" one can get.

"Oh, so you PES C storeman lah, wah lao chao keng."

"See those PES E ones. So good sia, 8-5 job leh"

"Arty so slack, wait you come my OCS course then you die arh!"

"Don't compare with me can? !@#%$#$ My SOC got bring dummy hor."

And the examples are endless, given that every single guy I know would talk about NS once the conversation starts. But what exactly qualifies one to comment on others? Only when they have went through them, that is what I strictly believe. You are not qualified to say that one's life path is smoother until you have really went through the sweat and blood the other person went through.

What makes you think a man does lesser than a specialist? Or a specialist lesser than an OCT?

What makes you think that people's 8-5 job is better than your stay-in one?

What makes you think that a tankie is a better/ worse life than an infantry trooper?

What, makes you so different that you can look down on others?

Is it the elitist culture? Is it one's upbringing? Is it one's ignorance?

There are no singular answer, and there will never be one. It's time to stop gloating or boasting. Every life is unique in itself. You might complain that the PES E guy have a good life, but would you exchange for that job for a hole in your heart?

-- "Silence and Absolution" by Pui Kit in his blog "The Detached World"


Glenn and I had a chat with one of the MT drivers during this Bersama Lima Exercise. As I am typing this, I couldn't recall what exactly did that driver say that make me realise how tough a driver's life actually is. All that I can remember now is the shitty job (in my opinion) of camouflaging a 5-tonner with a 15 metres by 15 metres camouflage net.

Trust me, I have handled camouflage nets before. A 12 X 12 one is frustrating enough.

And these guys have to climb up the tonners to do the camouflage. Apart from tired arms and sweaty backs, they also risk losing their footing and fall down the height of a tonner.

Oh, they also risk being charged with speeding. Or with crashing the military vehicle. They risk being sent to the detention barracks.

On a separate occasion during this exercise, I spoke to the signaller attached to us. Their jobs ain't as simple as we had always assumed.

Prolonged, excessive built-up of lactic acid in your muscles is not the ONLY shitty thing that can happen to you in National Service. I now realise how bad the lives of the seemingly slack vocations can be.

We are all in this together. The grass is not always greener on the other side.

Exile

The thing about doing sentry duty while you are in outfield is that you feel like you're being exiled. Like the Exile Island in Survivor. You are away from conversations, you are away from gossips, you are away from keeping yourself updated on the latest happenings in the platoon, you are away from making connections with your friends. I now know exactly how lonely and desperate those contestants in Survivor feel when they are sent to Exile Island. The desperate need to be informed, to be connected and to feel the warmth of familiarity, the lonliness when you know that your friends are happily chirping and gossiping while you are alone in silence and darkness in an foreign environment.

The only difference between Survivor and outfield, and also the element that makes outfield sucks more than Survivor, is that you are exiled to a place no more than 50 metres from the civilisation of familiar faces and the comfort of safari beds. You can still hear their laughter, and at times, the exact conversations between your other friends.

You know what's going on, but you can't be in it. Technically you are still informed and updated, but you are still missing out on something. You eavesdrop on their
conversations to beat the boredom of manning the sentry post, only to be reminded of the pathetic situation you are in right now. So lonely, so desperate. Their giggles and loud roars only serve to contrast the overwhleming silence of your surroundings that engulfed you rather than to tease you with a small taste of familiarity in an unknown terrain.

Being exiled also has its advantages. Away from all the commotion, you get a chance to think. Just thinking. No holds barred. Academical, intellectual, philosophical, sexual, political, visionary, or simply just daydreaming. If use wisely, it can help you orientate yourself -- help you know what you want to do. My post-ORD plans are now carefully planned.

But it still suck being alone. Quality time by yourself is still lonely time. For someone like me who values relationships and connections with others more than anything else, it's better to screw up your life than to lead a lonely life.

Couldn't Keep Up

I was looking back at my archived entries and was amazed by how much I could blog in the past. The blogging urge that I once had, those seemingly endless inspirations are now something which the current me is envious about.

Yue Kai tagged and inquired about the lack of an updated blog. And it just dawned upon me that I just couldn't keep up.

It's not as if I have nothing to write about; in fact I have lined up so many different stories to share with readers of my blog over the past few months, or even the past year, but only a handful of them was actualised.

Procrastination? Perhaps. I have a lot to say, but there's something missing. Like a missing ingredient. An essential ingredient that will again ignite the passion I once had for blogging.

The documentations on my blog is certainly not an accurate illustration of my life. It's not that mundane. Probably too much is happening, and I just couldn't keep up.

It's the same feeling for the various progess my friends are making in their respective lives. Which universities are they going? What courses are they pursuing? Double degree? Which country are they heading to for their tertiary education? Are the guys proudly serving their country or currently in the Medicine faculty? Which units are the guys posted to? What's their ranks? Are they now PES A or PES C? Are they still attached? Have they separated? Is there a class outing?

And it doesn't help when your social circle has a circumference as that of the Equator. I am not complaining about knowing too many people, or boasting about how many people I know (in fact, I say how many people I know, and not how many friends I have) It's just that somehow you feel obliged to keep yourselves updated on their current status.

Which is why I love Facebook and MSN Messenger. I can roughly know how each and everyone is doing by scanning through their nicknames and status bars.

And then you feel obliged to meet up with them and attend outings and gatherings. I don't detest most of them; in fact I do miss them sometimes. But sometiems you just can't bear to bring yourself to go meet them.

Because you know that there would be awkwardness when you guys meet. This awkward conversation of inquiring everoyne about their current status. This awkaward conversation of revolving around superficial topics like, "How's life?", "How's uni?", and "How's NS?". A convenient question to fill the gaps of awakward silence, an open-ended question that has potential to prolong the survival of conversations, which usually fail anyways because the respondants usually feel the same awkwardness as well and will summurise their current lives within seven words.

You ask an awkaward question, and you will get an awakward response.

We know that, yet we still ask the same questions.

We have failed to keep up with each other's lives.

And not that we can even keep up with our own lives.

Just to let all of you to keep up with my life, I will be away for an Exercise from 11/10/08 to 17/10/08. And 13/10/08 will be my blog's 4th anniversary.

Do SMS me while I am away from civilisation. Keep me updated.