This past 2 weeks have presented a series of good and bad news.

Haiz...

Nteam: Almost passed ergo.. failed by one second, but generally improving, thank god. Announcement of the small boat going for sea games only. Chances for me going are hence slim, due to poor attendance due to stupid ns and my lame ass running.

So i've worked a running program out to get my damned running back on track. 2.4km under 9min10secs will be possible soon I hope.

Safsa: The letter FINALLY came. BUT, oc wont let me go. Haiz.... I wish I wasn't so damned hao lian and had to tell them I had experience in operation flashpoint. Now cpt chua wont let me go full time due to my "duties" with the projects and stuff, and part time is looking grim too. Gotta bug melvin to do something. Haiz......


Kenah food poisoning or something two days ago. Walau eh... ran to the toilet like 8 times in the office? Then the taxi ride back was the ultimate mental test... almost puke + lao sai in the cab hahaha Finally ran to the toilet at home and almost blacked out while releasing hahahaha yuuuuck.

I was constructive today, hoorah. Did a new song. But my web server is down so I can't post it here right now. I can't believe the 40gb bandidth limit is used up again. Wth do ppl download nowadays?

These two days on mc have rendered my dota skills to godly status hahaha. Very difficult to find worthy opponents nowadays.

Thats all for today.

Tomorrow is THE day.

We all thought that it would be 'the' day, but it turns out its going to be "THE" day.

So soon. Maybe I expected it all along.

So many are already expressing their realistic yet negative thoughts.

I'm just afraid that cutting the team to half on paper will cut the team in half, period.

Need to fly damn fast tomorrow.

Its the final selection.

Company cohesion day was fun. Cycling, Canoeing, playing frisbee, and dodgeball.

Haha on the third round of dodgeball I was untouchable btw, hoohah!

I sprained some weird small muscle tendon or something on the left side of my back... it hurts like a pinch when I try to twist to my left or shoulder press >_<


Got a distress call from Dennis. Erm... bugger had some misinformation or something. As much as I tried to resist being the hero to clear things up, and reminded myself that if let my ego take over and be the hero to help the them, they will grow weaker while I grow stronger. Dependance on me is the last thing I need from them. They need to learn and grow on their own, learn how to handle these kind of things.

But... partly because the miscom wasn't their fault entirely, and partly because my credibility was on the line, afterall, I was the one who taught him, and assured bugger that all would go well once I left... so I went and did it. They still need to clear things up on their end tomorrow anyway.

Then there's the suprising appearance of some people at nteam training haha.

And some distress on decisions.

I had the choice back then to work on the alumni team. But I didn't.

Partly because an opens mens boat requires 20 guys... ridiculous... half of the alumni would have beer bellies by the time we had those numbers.

And seeing the realistic number of hours of training we were going to be up against...

And ns killing alot of my time, completely from the team probably.

Even if we had the best rowers from recent years come back... Hong, Boonsan, weiwen, chester, roy, jingwei, james, ah san, winston, jon, and me, we would have one of the best baby boats, but there are no races for mens baby boats.

It seemed like the ultimate losing battle.

One battle that I didn't want to take.

I just wanted to row, with a strong team.

And more and more, all around me, were signs telling me that I was out of nyp, that I wasnt a student anymore, that its time to move on.

Like-minded people need to come together instead of fight their own battles.





But maybe thats what everyone thinks, thats why theres not enough alumni.

If your chances are better, go for it.

Things were more fun when we were the underdogs anyway.

Overtrained.

Lats cannot make it already haha. I think if I tried, I couldn't do more than 30 pullups.

I failed the damned ergo timing lah... 5 seconds short. Need to go and do again. Tomorrow hopefully, hopefully sir will let me leave early from cohesion day and skip the bbq to go and do the damned test. Haiz...

And then there's BI-ATHLON TEST on sunday.... run until wanna die... then need to row until wanna die. And today's try outs went like hell. Last for every set. That is like... imposibble lah... I know I'm not too awesome, but I sure as hell can't be so behind for every set. Something wrong with the damned boat, or with Rue's coxing. He sits on the right of the boat when I row right? That's kinda screwed up... you should sit at the other side to counter balance.

It seems all these tests are standing inbetween me and the seagames, and I'm not sure if I can overcome all of them.


Then there's safsa. I've given up waiting for the damned letter already, its taken so long, and I see so much that the team has to do before its competitionally ready. I can't believe I let it go so easily, now that life is easy again, until mom hit me with something on the way back: "You gave up being an officer so that you can row for safsa, and do your music, and now every night you come back so late from national team training, tired, no time for anything... how can you give up on what you've worked so hard so far for?"

Maybe I'm just fraustrated. I've done everything in my power, everything, I swear, and yet, the damned letter needs to take 2 months plus just to be typed out and signed? And, not to sound stuck up or anything, but other national players from other sports would be sucked out immediately from bmt or from their units ASAP to be absorbed into centralized safsa training. I hear too many stories already. But for dragonboat? This kind of thing happens. It makes you wonder how serious the guys running dragonboat are about the sport, it makes you wonder what the hell is going on.

And yes, I'm pissed off. Because I've sacrificed so much for this, and yet nothing is materializing. I keep telling myself and people that it will happen, but nothing is! And I see the officer cadets around camp, and it pisses me off, when I wonder whether I made the right choice. When back in bmt all my sergeants told me that I would make it into ocs easily. That my platoon mates say that I should be the one going, and I had to work so hard to get them to put me on a bad rating for the peer appraisal, and yet some blur cocks screwed it up and still put me high.

And then I went and told Kevin to take my place for ic, encouraged him to go for ocs, gave up my spot for platoon best. Afterall, the award would be better off helping someone else get into ocs.

And at the pop, it was bittersweet, seeing him there. When I could've been there, marching up to get the award.

When I told OC about my plans, he looked at me, pointed his finger at me, and told me "If I were you, I would go to ocs." His path was all too similar to mine, I know that he felt that it would be the ultimate pursuement. But I told myself that I had better plans. That Keith told me that if I were to pursue a commander's role, my commitment and time with the team would be greatly compromised.

So yeah. The frustration of my life in a nutshell.

And guess what? Dwarf just msged me telling me that my safsa letter is ready to be picked up.


Ohh.... how you mock me. I'm so pissed with you at times. I swear. Is it just because I do not honor your sabbath? I don't care. This changes nothing between us.

ASAC course today.

Met michael, another long lost pegasus company mate haha. We reminisced of Sgt Isa and other peggie stuff.

Of all the ppl I met during bmt, I miss Sgt Isa the most. Tho he was the most sia lan, stuck up and hao lian ppl that I've met in my life, he's also one of the few ppl that I respect alot. And the color I sense in him is so unique.... Dark red, almost black.

Anyway, it was nice doing maths again. Fun fun fun. And the warrant officer was so lively and comical.

My shoulders ache... 320 pushups during training yesterday... Was supposed to do 500 for being ONE minute late on top of the 80 we did for training. Haven't ached like this in a long time haha. Quite song.

Its been so long since I've blogged.

I think I've got about the ideal ns life right now. Stay out everyday, doing what I like, 3d modelling, games design for ns. And soon, dragonboating for ns. The damned safsa letter still not here yet wah piang eh can wait until I'm old lah.

As I was saying... everyone around the office is nice, there's a pool table... so I'm getting better and learning alot from alot of pros around there, then there's lunch time gyming with tzehao. Going to bring my ps2 in soon so we can train some serious mvc2 and sfa3 ownage.

Haiz... then there's alot of stress around nteam now. We'll probably be sending only 15 guys for the sea games out of our... 25+? That means rowing tests, ergo tests, fitness tests, to see who are the top 15.

Can I make it? I don't know.

If its going to end up like on saturday... where everyone's strength is about the same, and the new guys end up getting beached again. Haiz.. I dunno.

It makes sense in a way, if you can't decide between your rowers will you choose the more experienced one who has been with you for so long, or the young gun?

I need to get godly. And fast. Right now I'm on level 14 on zhilin's insane pullup routine. If I get to level 25 like he is I'll rule the pullup world.

Need to run more, and ergo more.

Haiz... individual rowing time trial looks like my best best right now. I need to work on my weaker spots. I want penguin to cox for me. Somehow I trust him and his encouragements seem the most real to me.

Feel like staying in camp. Its like a damned chalet lah hahaha. Got nice gym, can play basketball, pool, tv and ps2 soon. Played basketball with them the other day. Wah piang eh.. I think when I play with them I deprove like toot haha.

Ok... I gotta go be constructive now.

so today's 4 hour training session left alot of us very dulan haha.

I mean... 4 hours of training kinda sucks. It leaves you not only physically tired but mentally tired... almost unable to psyche up for the next set.

Then the buoys in bedok res are so screwed up... and being in the stupid lesser crew boat, and having to pace with each other, and... argh..........

Fell asleep in the afternoon just now. Shit........

So I've come to the conclusion that over the past few days, I've had a sleep dept, which led to some... complications over my perspectives.

Ugh...

On weekdays: Going back and forth camp all the way at the end of singapore + nteam trainings at night, after which I rush home to eat, shower and sleep asap to try and catch at least 6 hours of sleep.

On weekends: Saturday morning, gotta report to camp by 745am, then training in the afternoon till 7pm, eat, reach home at about 9pm, shower, relax for abour 1-2 hours, try and catch at least 6-7 hours of sleep because on sunday morning there's training at 9am at kallang, that means wake up at about 7am.

I'm going mad I'm going mad.

Really need to take some breaks from training, or else this sleep dept is going to drive me bonkers.

I was so screwed up till I've been contemplating whether it was a good idea to downgrade or not. And whether I should upgrade or not. The possibility to get my sergeant rank is still there.

I still remember the time where I almost signed 5 years of my life away to the red berets.

Its stupid to say that that is a shallow goal about ego and 'honor'. Combatants always seem more garang. It would be hypocritical. Because one could say the exact same thing about joining the team for dragonboat.

Perhaps I just need some balance in life. Maybe thats why Clark Kent had a calm day job. He needed the emotional balance for his hectic alter-ego life.

Perhaps only by having contrast, one can see the balance, and the harmony. Being overwhelmed in either side is to be blind.




Ran to Bishan gym to do stupid ergo just now. Damnit why do I suck so bad at it?! Timing was 3:30mins for 1km. Which is a... fail grade by 1 sec. Shit! Getting there, getting there. Then I ran back home.

Working on some music now. Finally got an interesting idea on how to arrange "training to be soldiers". This is going to rock haha.

Losing focus.

So now, I've got everything that I want.

A nice 8-530pm ns vocation designing games in an airconditioned room. Alternate days are spent travelling directly to kallang for training, then rushing home to eat, shower and sleep to wake up early the next morning.

There's even time for me to go to the gym or go for a run during lunchbreak at camp. My only complaint is that camp is so bloody far away... like... 1.5-2 hours travelling time by mrt then bus.

Not sure why, but right when I get everything that I want.. I can't find much joy in it. I look at the ocs cadets around camp, falling in, running around, and wonder if I made the right choice.

Right now I can't even feel excited about going to the sea games. It should be like a big thing, right? But I just can't feel anything.

Has NS made me numb? Or maybe I've been dragonboating for so long that its time for me to take a break.

Went to play basketball, at that court down the street. So many years ago I used to play there everyday. Anytime I'd go down and I'd know people there. Now, all strangers.

Then I had the weirdest compulsion to drop by taekwondo class. Gave Sir a call... his number still hasn't changed... and changed into my gi and headed down.

I look so different in the gi now... its been what, 3-4 years since I last put it on? I remember how excited I was when I first got that black collared gi, with my black belt. And I remember the pride which I felt when I wore it for the first time, with my name enbroidered in golden chinese characters on the belt.

Taekwondo was the first place where my perception of "discipline" was widened.

Where I learnt not to move when I wasn't supposed to, not to look around when I wasn't supposed to.

Where I once felt stupid having to shout stupid nonsensical gibberish, where I later learnt how to give a blood curdling scream.

Where I learnt to beauty and art of movement and choreography, and learnt how to fly, and make objects fly.

Where I discovered how difficult it was to control a class, where I learnt to make them shut up and stand still with a single word.

Where I learnt to shout and scream at them with my mouth, then where I learnt that I could do the same thing more quietly with my eyes.

Where I learnt to think about what my opponent is thinking, where I learnt to read other people.

Where I learnt how powerful if felt to be able to knock a person out, where I learnt the fear and remorse when I actually did.

Where I learnt ultimately, self control, and through that, compassion, and perhaps, a fear of myself.

And through all that, He was there. The first person whom I called "Sir".



Alot has changed, in the class. The poom belts are very "nua". Only the imported black belt showed any form of control over his surroundings. Which is sad.

It was at that class, which I discipled my first 4 junior black belts. Taught them understanding of the class. How to not take things personally, and think of solutions from an outside perspective.

Sad that they weren't there today. Its been so long, afterall. Perhaps they too found other areas in life that they wish to pursue.


It felt good to revise through some of the kata. My movements seem to have gotten swifter and faster somehow. I missed the "WHITZ" sound that the gi makes when you execute a punch or block.

Perhaps this ia time of some soul searching for me, to find my fire again.

All I know is I can't go on pretending that nothing is wrong.