My life in the Singapore Armed Forces till now.
I enlisted on
4 March 2013, or 040313 as the SAF would have it. It was just two months ago. I
arrived early at Pasir Ris Bus Interchange (or PRBI) with my parents. Buses
were charted by the dozens and were waiting for us to board. The morning was
pretty uneventful, mundane almost, but the anticipation on what was to come
kept everyone slightly on edge. We were whisked away to Pulau Tekong by the
both loved and loathed (for book outs and book ins respectively) ferries. First
we were promptly separated from our parents, and were led up a long flight of
stairs where we had to take our weight, since I am from the BP batch and weight
is all the rage there. Once we had our BMI recorded our civilian ICs were taken
away and we were handed our 11Bs, which is just a fancy way of saying “Army
Identity Card.” I was put in Gryphon Company (02/13)
The rest of
the day was classic, having our not-so-tasty meal with our parents, reluctantly
waving goodbye to them, collecting our field and duffel bags and most
importantly, getting our heads shaved, the classic representation of SAF’s
intiation ritual.
The confinement week is almost blur now though it only ended 6 weeks ago. My section and I bonded in a matter of days, they are all pretty awesome guys and by the end of the confinement week we were close enough that someone might mistake us for having been friends for years, but I guess forced communal living with eleven other guys will cause you to develop a tighter version of friendship with those guys. First it was just "Bro" or "Hey" but soon we all learned each others names deliberately and by the end of the first week, everything was second nature.
One interesting thing happened on our first morning, I had accidentally set the alarm way to early and woke everyone save myself, which resulted in the section becoming closer to me, and I was conferred the not-so-longlasting title of "Wake Up Man."
The first 5-6 weeks were mostly just PT, PT and a lot more PT. We did Aerobic Conditioning and the ridiculously fun Aerobics and the ridiculously not-so-fun aqua jogging classes.
And then the day came, the day that we would be presented our rifles.
We waited late into the evening and were presented our rifles during the last light of the day. The day would be the harbinger of my days as the armskote 2IC (humourously so)
And then came IPPT, I wish I could have done better for my pull ups and standing broad jump. But then, improvement is the way.
...
Meet-the-Parents session
Yes! we have this in the SAF too, but then again, we are teenage conscripts, so it is understandable. It was only yesterday. It was rather uneventful, although it was fun to be able to book out with my parents. And we practically did no training for the whole day, which was only until 11am.
This is an extremely short summary of what happened and it is missing a lot of interesting snippets, but you shall have to be content for now.
We waited late into the evening and were presented our rifles during the last light of the day. The day would be the harbinger of my days as the armskote 2IC (humourously so)
And then came IPPT, I wish I could have done better for my pull ups and standing broad jump. But then, improvement is the way.
...
Meet-the-Parents session
Yes! we have this in the SAF too, but then again, we are teenage conscripts, so it is understandable. It was only yesterday. It was rather uneventful, although it was fun to be able to book out with my parents. And we practically did no training for the whole day, which was only until 11am.
This is an extremely short summary of what happened and it is missing a lot of interesting snippets, but you shall have to be content for now.
