Finally return back from 5 days of obs. Was too tired yesterday to post since i slept the instance i got home till this morning. The camp was fun but seriously too tiring. Can’t imagine how anyone was able to survive the 21 days camp. Luckily there was this journal thing that we were supposed to write otherwise i would have simply forgotten most of the stuff :s.
Day 1. The entire day was mainly packing stuff for the rest of the days. Got the rations pack which was everything we had for lunch and breakfast throughout the camp. Contained a lot of food stuff and powder drinks which didn’t seem like much but was actually quite filling when eaten after that. There was some trust falling thing after that where we were supposed to fall from a “structure” 1m plus high and trust our watch-mates to catch us from the fall. Was really scared at first since even if you really trust everyone there, it was still some height which you are falling from. At least everyone managed to carry my weight and prevent me from falling. After that was the belaying thing which is basically climbing up some wooden pole but the safety ropes were controlled by the belayer. Belaying was rather fun especially when you are the climber :P. After that, kerrie, the instructor, made us pack our stuff for the expedition. She told us that it would be a lot easier when clearing up if we used less haversacks which we regretted listening to some time later. I paired up with teck lim to pack the haversack but ours was sooo heavy that i was pretty sure no one in our watch could pack something heavier. Dinner was cooking with the solid fuel which wasn’t too hard except for the rice in which the timing must be correct. The rest is just opening can food and heating them up. Had to pitch the tent to sleep in. At least there was sleeping bag to double up as a pillow instead of keeping warm which was seriously NOT needed.
Day 2. Freaking tired. Not enough sleep plus couldn’t sleep well to begin with. Didn’t expect morning pt to exist in this course but it did remind me that there was something was veryyyyyy wrong with my legs as it was shaking during the warm-ups. First thing was the DDD ( completely forgotten the full name ) which was some wooden logs hung up parallel to the ground from a very high pole and had a few meters in between each one making it hard to get up. Everyone had to go in pairs so that they can help each other get up since doing it alone is simply impossible for most. Paired up with stacy to climb this which was supposed to be hard and tiring but i felt it was rather funny as i tried to do some funny stuff to go up like grabbing the log and doing a chin-up to which made it a lot easier until i couldn’t reach the log as the length in between was getting greater. In the end had to depend on stacy to help me up ><. Also tried to put both legs onto the logs and pull myself up which failed sooooo badly but gave everyone a good laugh :P. Next was the trek to camp 1 which was very tiring. Not used to carrying such heavy bags and complained a lot. Swapped with teck lim who was carrying water bottles thinking that his was a much easier job in which i regretted a whole lot. Luckily, jenz and teck lim decided to be nice and help carry it too or else i would have really died XD. When we finally reached, my hands was shaking so badly i couldn’t even clench my fist or bend my fingers much. There was the kayaking training after that which was a lot harder then i expected. Being the only 2 star kayaker ( dunno the correct term for it ) there, i was allowed to take the single kayak which made it easy for me to move fast. Hence, i was supposed to head quickly for the buoy and make everyone raft up with me. At first kerrie made me hold onto one of the bottle which was attached onto the buoy but i released it by accident when my finger started bleeding due to cuts from the sharp stuff on it. Had to carry on grabbing onto the buoy itself after that which was hard as the wave was really great and so was the wind. The buoy was also very slippery too. Luckily there were some people there like timo and gloria who kept on “cheering” me on otherwise it would have been a lot tougher. Held on for like 20+ minutes but released it in the end since my hand could no longer take it. The sight of my hand was rather scary since there was blood all over it. Some funny stuff that happened here was when melvin who obviously could not find anyone to partner with had the privilege of getting the last single kayak. However… … … … the first thing he did was capsize!!! Hahaha! Really funny watching him complain about the waves being too strong for his kayak to not capsize. In the end, jorg and truman went to rescue him. I don’t exactly remember what jorg said about melvin screwing up the rescue so go find him for the other stupid stuff that melvin did before he got back into the kayak. During that time, everyone was taking turns to be trained by the instructors on how to do a rescue in the middle of the sea which took really long. Now, the situation in my legs was getting much better but the situation in my hands worsened badly. Luckily there was sea water all around so the four cuts on my fingers managed to heal a lot faster. Dinner was fantastic. Ate catered food in the cook house and we had to do was to help wash the dishes :D. Kerrie then kept on pestering me about the wound on my finger due to the kayak training, asking me if i required any medication which i didn’t need since it was after all just some small cuts. Slept in the tent again which me, timo and tecklim pitched for us and melvin to sleep in.
Day3. Woke up really tired again and prepared to leave for the land expedition. We were supposed to find 4 out of 8 checkpoints somewhere in pulau ubin which were not very close to each other. The formation was just as expected where me and tecklim were navigators and jens was sweeper. Halfway through, one of the gates was locked and our road was blocked… … Was really amazed when timo actually managed to hack open the number lock. We then walked for another few hours and went to the check points. There was one at a german girl shrine which was a place where the people living there buried the german girl who was killed during world war 2. We were then made to find out about the place and prepare for a presentation to the mobile buddy group, nila utama. Just realised that my group wasn’t stated in this post, its raffles by the way. All the groups were named after famous explorers ( i think ). Our last check point was at ubin village where we had some activity in where we were supposed to throw stones to each other in a circle and catch the one which was thrown at you 3 times in a row. Was pretty hard at first until we used a staircase method which where we poured the stone downwards and let the last person throw his stone up for the one at the top to catch. After that, we got the location of our camping site and headed for it. Halfway through, almost the entire watch started singing to keep the moral up. Was really funny watching them laughing and singing despite the heavy weight on their shoulder and the bottles some were carrying. Even though what they sang was really stupid, it really liven up the mood and greatly boosted the morale. There, i was appointed sea expedition leader for the expedition the next day. Wanted to be navigator but was afraid that the wound on my hand wouldn’t allow it. Decided to be the port side “marker” instead. Yuki was then made navigator, truman starboard and jens sweeper. Had noodles for dinner where there was so much extra that i had 4 servings which was nothing compared the what the rest of the guys ate. There were people like chris who wouldn’t stop passing the food over despite me being already very full. There was a briefing made by the sea-ex leaders after that about what was planned the next day and stuff like the weather conditions and the tide. Went to sleep after that but had to wake up when it was my tent’s turn to do sentry duty. Despite being really tired, it was rather worth it since the night view was seriously perfect. Tried to head over to the other camping site with timo but gave up half-way since the road was very dark and that the road following after that had wasn’t tall grasses but was forest like again.
Day 4. Starting to get lazy to type already, exceeded the 1500 word count some time back. Either way, it was the day for the sea-ex! The original plan was for the first pedal to be at 8 and that we reach chek jawa at 10.30 and camp 2 at around 4. Lunch was also planned to be eaten before ubin village jetty. We were all made to use double kayaks for this sea-ex so i paired up with stacy which was a really good decision. Before we headed out, there was a morning assembly which was a tradition before leaving for any seas-ex where we each shouted out a word about our expectations for the journey. When we headed out, we went at an abnormally fast speed and reached chek jawa at around 9!?!?!? Keeping up the speed, we pressed on really quickly and at the point where we expected to have lunch, it was only 10+ and no one wanted to eat anything. The entire sea-ex was really fun, haven’t kayaked for quite some time already plus it was a double kayak so i didn’t dare try to do the really fun turning thing. Even though it was rather tiring being a sea-ex leader since controlling everyone who was moving out of place wasn’t easy, at least stacy was there to help kayak whenever i needed to rest a bit or even helping me to shout for the others to move back into formation. Was really funny watching melvin’s stupid paddling and hearing tecklim complain about him. Half way through, i accidentally scooped up a fish by mistake and it dropped into my kayak!!! Was rather freaky at first having a fish flipping in front of me but was really fun after it stopped flipping around swam in the water that got poured in. First time i ever had a fish in the kayak! Too bad timo came over and threw it back into the sea… Reached camp 2 at about 12+ which was the fastest and surprised the instructors there. Washed the kayaks till about 1.30 before having lunch on solid land :D. After that was the jetty jump that i had been anxiously waiting for. We were supposed to go up the plank and say out our goals for the camp before jumping into the water about 2.5m below. When jumping, i felt rather scared but it seemed like forever after that as i don’t know why but i felt as though it took longer than expected to enter the water. Unpacked all the stuff we brought and prepared to go home the following day. Had a really nice dinner which was finally normal food. Joined with other watches to have dinner which was really fun. Shared 2 mass tins with timo, jorg and tecklim, one for food, the other for soup. The food was really delicious., haven’t eaten anything like this since the start of camp. After that, when we were all really full, there was this remaining pot of soup which failed to finish as it sux badly compared to the soup cooked by my watch. It was then they came up with an idea where we played scissors-paper-stone and the loser(s) gets to drink a ladle of the soup :P. I lost 4 rounds in a row before giving up since i could feel soup somewhere in my gullet already XD. We then pitched tent one last time before “sleeping”. Timo was obviously not going to sleep before some fun and obviously i was in some really LARGE trouble. Don’t wish to elaborate on that but it was funny hearing the girls in the other tent shouting due to noise that we created.
Day 5. Finally the last day. Started to pack and wash everything within the store and prepare to go home. It was then that we realised that we lost quite a few stuff. Supposed to have lost a compass but we traded a water bottle for it. In the end, we were short of a tent bag ( amazingly ), a bottle and a jack knife. There was the morning circle after that where we wrote our journal and there was this cotton twine activity thing where we tied a ring around our fourth finger and passed it to someone who we wished to thank during this camp. The rope was then cut and kerrie begun on the usual lecture. The group photo and certificate was then given out to everyone which i didn’t exactly like a lot since i wasn’t looking or smiling either!?!?! We then gathered at the jetty before leaving finally towards s’pore. Luckily for me, the first 3 watches were made to ride the normal large slow boat while the first 6 people of my watch was then allowed to ride the speed boat back :). Was the first to return so the queue to check the bags wasn’t too long. Returned to the obs reception centre after that to buy the obs shirt before leaving. Really tired after that. Went for lunch at the nearby coffee shop before heading home to sleep.
To be continued… … … …
