home
Whaha, finally home after 3wks of exile in the desert of India...Hmm, generally speaking, it wasn't as bad as expected. They had those kind of container-like bunks set up for us wif all the proper facilities such as toilets, a cookhouse(where we have our meals if we're in-camp), they even have a basketball court which we dun get to use, haha. It was a totally useless trip for me cos imagine this, I'm a tank gunner(whether i'm spare or not is not the point, i'm a spare gunner btw) but I din fire a single shot during this 3wks in India, quite disappointed larz, all I did was sai kang cos I was in the butt party for the live firing lorz.
Hmm, my coy(company) seems 'sway' to some ppl cos the moment we touched down at the India training camp, it rained tt night and every night for the nxt few days when the previous coy din experience any rain at all in India. From my perspective, other than the fact tt it's very cold, it's a good thing cos our night trainings are cut short due to the rain, haha. One thing spectacular bt the nights are the stars. Phew, there's nowhere in Singapore, nt even on Tekong, tt can match the stars u can see on a clear, cloudless night in India outfield.
The spare crew(my crew) got a chance to take part in a FTX(full-troop exercise) wif the coy on the 6th March. The experience was great in terms of training for us but in terms of performance, hai, our performance was horrendous to say the least. About an hour after the FTX began, we were required to set up artificial camouflage for our tank - my worst nightmare. The timing to meet for completing the camouflaging is 30mins but for the whole of 2hrs of rest time, we were struggling to get our camouflage up *sigh^3* The other ppl set up their's quickly and got to rest lorz. After tt, the mission for the coy was dissipated among the vehicle commanders and our crew once again, performed terribly. Our tank's movements wif the platoon was not up to standard and you bet, our OC was not happy at all! By nightfall, we were told by our PC to have at least 1 person manning the CMG at all times but when our PC paid us a visit at ard 1am, my crew was all sleeping and we got reprimanded by PC lorz. We performed slightly better for our mission the nxt day but really very 'sway' lorz, we broke our antenna. Felt really low morale wif regards to our performance at the FTX. I jus felt tt our PC had too much expectations of us lorz, I mean, it's the first time my crew is involved in a FTX sia, nvr trained wif the coy at all b4 tt lehz. We were really 'lost sheep' in the midst of the coy lorz.
Due to time constraint(as explained by my PS, duno larz), I din get the chance to fire an FS round at the coy live firing lorz. Hai, tt was something to look forward to for the India trip and I din get the chance, you can imagine, my trip to India was totally useless in my perspective lorz.
Enough abt training le, it wasn't really a happy memory larz, but oh, what the hell, my future doesn't lie wif the SAF anyway, why shud I bother too much bt my performance there right? =P
Some interesting stuff abt India on the whole. They have cows, wild boars, buffaloes everywhere on the street feeding on almost anything they can find lorz. In the more rural areas, the houses have dried cow dung which are stacked in certain patterns. Most houses(1-floored only) have cow dung placed on the top of the building like bricks. I assume it helps to keep the house cool in the day maybe. At night, I guess they burn the cow dung in the house to provide warmth lorz. Our training area is jus nxt to a village and so there're civilians everywhere lorz. The kids come to our a-vehicles and when they summon enough courage to talk to us, they ask for food. After we've done our firing, the villagers will all dash into the butt area to collect the cartridges to sell and earn $$ lorz.
Cows in India are considered sacred I think, they're untouched(as in killed) by the Indians and left to grow old and die. Imagine wat a good life they lead compared to cows in other countries who usually end up at the slaughterhouse. During our training, I saw the cows eating cardboard lorz, haha, can you believe it?? Our bottled water come in boxes and we leave the boxes lying ard the trees and when cows pass by, they actually eat them up! Haha, we got to see lotsa animals during our training larz, very close up somemore. There were sheeps, dogs, cows and even camels! This will never happen in Singapore lorz, cos civilians are kept out of our training areas and during live firing, sentries and posted all ard the firing area to prevent unauthorised personnel from entering, endangering their lives. On the whole, the training in India was tough larz, I got to sleep in the day when we've set up the butt and the main crew are firing lorz. Heard from the main crew tt life during Ex Wallaby in Australia was much worse than the training here lorz. So I guess I'm quite lucky larz, anyway am back in Singapore le larz, can't ask for more le, hehe...During my time in India, I jus miss the variety of food we have in S'pore and also listening to english music lorz, was suffering mentally from lack of listening to my fav songs!
posted by sc @
Gran Torino - Jamie Cullum
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