On and off (especially during the weekends), I've been relying on YouVersion for devotional materials (at this moment, I'm reading one called Holy Emotions - Biblical Responses to Every Challenge), and this particular one struck me.

Put on the garment of praise! Rather than writhe in emotional pain. put your hands in the air and sing yourself into His presence!

Its hard to put something like this into practice. But I suppose when one endures so much, undergoes such lack, one becomes so much more acutely aware of one's needs - such that the fulfilling of them brings a far richer joy than it normally would - and that is how one could possibly attempt to sing praises.

07.05.12 Just the day before, the Straits Times published an article on depression among the elderly, and that couldn't have come at a much more relevant time - yesterday was the first time that I seriously considered the possibility that I could be suffering from (mild) bouts of depressive behaviour (I hesitate to deem it anywhere near clinical depression though). Perhaps it was just Sunday book-in blues, but they never felt that acute before; the afternoon prior to returning to camp (at 7pm, which was significantly earlier than what we normally were entitled to) was spent with thoughts of throwing things around, and bashing out dissonant sounds on the piano.

But enough rambling about the pains that I experienced the night before Monday; that day itself was filled with its own trials. We got up particularly early (4.10am for me) because of the live shoot that we had on that (especially long) day - that proved difficult due to the poor sleep I had, courtesy of the constant itches in the night, the chatty individual on his cellphone, the slamming of doors and the need to pee in the middle of the night.

Our first of two shoots (we had to familiarise ourselves with handling two weapons, in my case it was the SAW and GPMG) was the GPMG one, and personally, I found the commanders (chiefly sergeants) in charge of it to be quite lacking in traits that one would normally associate with leaders. Not only did they lack the capacity to plan and organise - they were unaware of the space constraints of shooting area until they got to the place, logistics were not ready when needed; they were also petty and short tempered - most of their instructions were delivered not in a rational but assertive manner, but rather in shouts, swears and a few good knock-it-downs thrown in for good measure. One example would be the command for everyone to leave the small training shed (that they failed to take note of prior to the shoot) in 5 seconds, is it any wonder that we failed? We were punished - 70 push-ups for that; for the unavoidable pandemonium that arose from constrains of the space we were in. That aside, the earlier part of the morning was pretty much wasted due to the rain, thereby also rendering our early reveille pointless - we only started the GPMG shoot at 9.45am (gosh, I truly wished, at that point in time that those lost hours could have been translated into additional sleeping hours, in some ways it did - there were a fair bit of moments to nap between waiting). I suppose the frequent opportunities to lose sleep is part of God's plan to get my body used to the lack of sleep that will be an inseparable part of Architecture school.

The GPMG was relatively easy to handle (accuracy however is another thing), but to get to that few minutes of shooting, we had to wait for a time equivalent to the entire morning. Thankfully, the sergeants there had the common sense to send off those who were done with the GPMG shoot to the SAR shooting area - that way, it saved us some time when it was our turn to deal with the SAR weapon. Efficiency, at least some degree of it can indeed exist in the army, and it must be further promoted. Monday finally ended for us at 11.45pm, and we only reached back to camp at 12+, before sleeping at 2+. Yes, it was a long day, a long and exhausting one.

08.05.12 The night ended late, and the morning began early (6.40am for me, I wanted to call my folks - its something that I've been doing daily since BMTC) - I ended up with really few hours of sleep. I skipped some of the morning's stuff because I had some rashes that I wanted the MO to give me some cream for - I never knew that getting medical help in the army required such a long waiting time. There was the fear that it would worsen to something similar to what I had in my childhood - severe rashes that bled and oozed puss at the joints of my limbs. Quite scary indeed; rather reassuring was the MO's diagnosis (though that being said, I don't trust the medical service provided by the SAF) of it being "not very serious" and "localised". I suppose that was also a sign that down-PES-sing via a medical condition like eczema, much like what a Bronco platoon mate I met while waiting to see the MO did, would apply to me. (Its not as though I would want anything on my body to degenerate to that state however, I've been through that and it wasn't fun.) The rest of the day was spent mainly prepping for the next 3 days of Section field camp - packing our field pack, assault pack and ILBV. During the Mobility Training that came subsequently (it consisted of things like hopping and short sprints), my buddy and I were discussing whether a particular sergeant had an inferiority complex that he needed to (over) compensate for, based on how he spoke to, remarked about and reacted to the actions of different groups of recruits.

09.05.12 - 11.05.12 Section field camp was shorter than the one that I had in Tekong, but it felt far draggier and more painful to deal with - perhaps it was because my heart wasn't anywhere interested in what we were doing there: section and fire movement, being in the great outdoors, and field discipline to name a few. The fear of insufficient sleep was another - I have a terrible time sleeping in the great outdoors, waking up every hour wasn't something unusual, though that didn't make it any less annoying and torturous. Oddly enough, while the camp was shorter, I found it very physically and mentally exhausting, probably because the number of hours spent each day training was longer than the BMTC field camp, and also because I didn't excel at what was being done there. One example would highlight this perfectly: how I simply froze after experiencing an IA (basically when the weapon fails to work as it should) midways during a section movement exercise, amidst the shouting from all directions. My state of helplessness at remedying the IA (I was essentially rendered completely out of control), coupled with exhaustion from the heat and physical strains left me in a state of stoniness on the forest floor, where my sweat mixed freely with tears that were milked out of my weary body. It was a terrible state to be in, and it more than strongly reaffirmed my belief that I was not suited, and should not be in the infantry.

That was the attitude that I carried on into the last day, where we were supposed to have a test that tested our ability to work together as a section in a conflict. I really didn't want to participate in it, and particularly timely came a sore throat and a runny nose - the precursor to the (mild) cold that I'm suffering from at this present moment [of writing this post]. Yet I still was drafted to participate in it - the section commander had little choice, the other 2 members of the section simply weren't fit to participate (for differing reasons). I prayed for God to allow me to rest.

At just after 1pm, we were told that all field training was to cease, because an NS man who was training in the same area as us was involved in a serious accident. We later found out that the accident resulted in tragedy - that NSF lost his life. So yes, while I was spared training (for the camp and also the subsequent few days), it came at the expense of a human life. Sometimes, I really wonder why God would use such ways to work.

Without appearing to simply brush off addressing the above tragedy as a mere mention, we returned to camp really late - 11pm, others even later. We were the last company to reach back to our home base, and we paid the price: we were the only ones to not book out on Friday. At the time that we got back, the food out-rationed for us had expired - we were to remain hungry till about 11.30pm, when the pizzas that our company's sergeant-major had ordered for us arrived. It was extremely terrible to know that you could have left camp so much earlier (we ended everything at about 7, and were waiting there for the bus to arrive) - the bus arrived late, coupled with their refusal to enter the camp grounds (they seemed to have came to a consensus of simply waiting at the ground's main gate (a really long walk away), and the need to arrange for tonners to send us to that gate. It was awful, albeit much less than the poor NSF's fate of course. It wasn't the sergeants' fault; it was that of the bus company - did they not sign a contract, of which they had to meet it's terms and conditions? Was being punctual not one of them? Worse than waiting was the lack of information - it made waiting more agonizing, more drawn out - that is something that I fault the sergeants at, but then again, I suppose the bus company itself wasn't providing them with what they needed. I rest my case.

In this crazy parallel universe that I have to accept for 5 or more days in each week, I suppose my only source of strength should be, and can be God - I have to learn to trust in Him, to relegate control over my fate to Him and to simply believe in that divine plan laid out for my life. Help me.

Psalm 91:1-8 -

He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High
Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, "He is my refuge and my fortress;
My God, in Him I will trust."

Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler^[a]
And from the perilous pestilence.
He shall cover you with His feathers,
And under His wings you shall take refuge;
His truth shall be your shield and buckler.
You shall not be afraid of the terror by night,
Nor of the arrow that flies by day,
Nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness,
Nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday.

A thousand may fall at your side,
And ten thousand at your right hand;
But it shall not come near you.
Only with your eyes shall you look,
And see the reward of the wicked.