AIT - Advanced Infantry Training; 6 weeks long. Week one.

17.04.12 It was a Tuesday morning that started rather painfully - few would look forward to being a rifleman, where life was defined as being "chiong sua". Stepping into the camp was like being rudely awakened in the morning; I experienced a severe culture shock. The place was in an appalling condition - I was expecting at the very least Tekong's standard of upkeep. We were ushered into a smallish multi-purpose hall - one where cobwebs dotted the corner of the walls, where the stage's curtain was torn, where a sorry-looking mural that seemed to aim at inspiring hope welcomed us. Stepping into the COY (army-speak for a large unit of soldiers) line , I was definitely taken aback by how many shirtless individuals were just leaning over the corridors that overlooked us, most had tattoos, and the words that came out from their mouth were mainly Hokkien (swear words). These were the folks that I would be spending my time with for the next 6 weeks, and presumably the next 18 months as well. I was apprehensive, so were the other guys from Tekong. Trying to interact with them was difficult - simply because we shared so little common topics, because my comprehension of Hokkien was to say the least close to zero; my respite lay in my buddy (another Tekong guy). Interestingly enough, he was also a fellow HK PR. What pained me was the degree of regimentation in this particular camp - Charlie COY, 2SIR, it was something that would become more apparent in the coming days.

18.04.12

Isaiah 46:4 -
Even to your old age, I am He,
And even to gray hairs I will carry you!
I have made, and I will bear;
Even I will carry, and will deliver you.

I'm trying every day to pray for strength - that I believe is my only hope of sustaining myself through the week (which would last all the way until the late morning on Saturday).

The day began with our first parade at AMQ (Amoy Quee Camp, the initials of the place somehow reminds me of McQ, too bad it isn't nearly as fashionable). I had a terrible sleep the night before; I woke up constantly throughout the night - it was far too stuffy in the bunk, too warm to sleep comfortably. Some of my section mates had noticed my dark eye circles. The lack of sleep made staying still during the parade rather difficult - there was always this constant bodily urge to get some shut-eye. In my diary, there was quite a fair bit of beseeching to God to help me through the day, but I shall leave that out of this blog post - the fact that I am writing this post is sufficient of a testament to prove that the Lord does provide, that He does bring us through our sufferings.  Apart from learning all these technical handling stuff, I also had to learn to intact with people who were very different from myself - my section and platoon mates. At least they were friendly - that was a start, and it would make it easier later on in the week. On a side note, I realised that Far East's Cabana project is just beside my camp; I wouldn't want to stay anywhere beside an army camp. Another activity that tested my limits in this particular day was something called Combat Circuit. This was where the verse above proved particularly apt. The activity consisted of the following: firemen lifts, transporting (full) jerry cans, leopard crawling, dragging a "casualty" and sprinting - it was all very physical and draining. Yet I was carried through it by His hands, despite my belief those tasks were beyond my physical limits.

19.04.12 This day would prove to be a long, tough and arduous one, especially with the knowledge that I was not booking out on Friday, but a Saturday morning, all because of a live-shooting that we have on Friday. The morning started out with 5BX (5 basic exercises) - something which I haven't done for the longest time (the commanders at Bronco often skipped this). Subsequently after breakfast was a 1.6km cadence run, something which I found rather tiring (my physical fitness is going down the drain - if there was any to begin with), and right after that was 11BX - the most painful part was the push-ups that we had to do on the rough and sharp asphalt flooring of 2SIR's parade square. The afternoon was spent learning how to handle a SAW rifle (section automatic weapon) that I was assigned to (I'm a back-up shooter) - learning how to handle it was like learning how to deal with a SAR 21, only tougher. There were more components to dissect apart, more IA drills to learn etcetera. The hardest part was meeting the timing for the stripping and assembling of the weapon - the lesson ended with a test that I knew I had to pass - lest there be any RT sessions. Thankfully, I passed (albeit just). Which makes this particular verse particularly apt (I was praying like crazy to pass):

Jeremiah 33:3 - Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.

Unfortunately, life in a unit is all about extra duties as a form of punishments - and I hate how regimental that particular portion is.

20.04.12 The activity on this day was the very reason for a Saturday (late) morning book out. Urban Operations (UO) basically involved shooting in a room, both as an individual soldier and as a small unit (4 people). It wasn't conducted at AMQ camp, rather, it was done somewhere in Lim Chu Kang, which due to the morning traffic, was an especially long drive away - that compounded with the fact that the ride there was in a tonner, made it an especially painful morning (for my legs and bum at least; I was sitting on the floor). That aside, the individual component of the UO shoot was nothing too bothersome; the group shoots were far more unnerving. The feeling of a bullet whisking right by you (just a few metres away) is nowhere near comforting - that was especially the case in the night shoot, where things were close to pitch blackness. The reverberation of the formerly still air just right beside you is really quite scary. But in between those shoots, there was absolutely nothing to do except to wait - I regretted not bringing my Time magazine along with me. The day was monumentally long, but the night that succeeded that was even longer. Upon returning to camp, we had to return the dummy soft-plates that we inserted into our ILBVs, following that, we had to clean our rifles (the SAR 21 remains a devil to keep carbon-free). We reached back to camp slightly later than 12.30 am, and by the time I landed in my bed, it was 3.30 am - just 2+ hours away from our morning reveille timing.

The morning after (Saturday) was made especially terrible by the area cleaning that we had to do prior to our book out. The mono-intake guys in my section all knew very well of the sergeants' especially elastic take on book out timings. For that reason and more, I was the only one rushing to clean up the bunk - in the hopes that that would accelerate our book out time. What was I supposed to do, I am but a mere fish in a school - how could I possibly direct them all and control my fate. This lack of control over my circumstances and my fate is especially depressing; it leaves me feeling more miserable each day. The sergeants did not help by constantly compounding new things to clean, from just the room, to the windows, and then the fans. We finally left at 10.30am, far later than the 8.30am that they hinted at. I truly hate how they are such liars - how can one respect their superiors when they cannot even respect the time that those under them are allotted to rest? My buddy was lucky - he had a scholarship interview that day and left at 8am, freeing himself from the nonsense that is the army.

I feel especially tortured, I feel especially helpless; I truly hate the degree of regimentation at 2SIR.

God help me.