you're such a BOLONGY!

In the naked heat,

Saturday, November 19, 2011

in retrospect, at 10:45 AM

Attica yesterday was awesome. Do I always start posts in this manner? "--- yesterday was awesome." But well, I lead an awesome life. What to do? Anyway bloody hell that trumps my previous near-vomiting experience. Well, I drank a bloody lot. I mean, with all the magnum bottles in front of me and all of us were prepared to pool $100 each anyway, so I just drank and drank and drank - cause it's good life being VIP. Lost my consciousness for quite a bit there on the dance floor, but I pride myself in still being able to take care of a friend who was more drunk than me. Zero-vomiting-record still holds!

JCCJCCJCC

Friday, November 18, 2011

in retrospect, at 10:23 PM

Feeling good right now. Had two exercises this week to prepare us for JCC, Ex. Castaway and Ex. Robinson Crusoe. Basically Castaway was building and making all the things necessary for the Ex. Forager part of JCC, A-frames, monitor lizard traps and all. Robinson Crusoe was just climbing up and down steep knolls. That nearly took my life, maybe cause I was unwell, maybe cause it was "code black" that afternoon (heat waves) before it turned into a heavy downpour in a matter of minutes. That's Echo wing for you. Never fails to rain. It's creepy though, cause it feels too much like a curse. Our instructors joke that because they like tough training, during our major exercises they'll indent rain for us. But we all know that deep down there's some blood-curse on us. I mean, it rained on all of our major exercises (attack missions, defense missions, route marches etc.), our social night, our only nights out, what else?

But well, ok. I hallucinated on the second night of sleeping under the A-frame. Firstly it was the lack of bakau poles, so we sleep horizontally with 4 poles under our thighs, and 3 or 4 poles spaced out under our upper body. My ass and shoulder had no support. To say it was uncomfortable would be an understatement. I woke up more than ten times between 1am to 5am, and twice I dreamt that I was in bed at home, with an ATTN C (health status for high fever, it allows you to book out, go home and rest), waking up to my mum beside me and feeling a bit cheery that I got to skip Robinson Crusoe. Twice, I woke up from the dream and stared into the dark space, shivering with fever and headache. Took my temperature twice but the fucking thermometer registers a 37.0 both times. No idea why. I swear I was sick. But anyway.

I think right now I'm more or less recovered. I'm just having a lot of mucus. Thick, yellow-nearing-reddish mucus which never seems - you get the idea. I'm expending tissue at the rate of close to eight pieces per hour. But yeah, I got to book out today, I'm planning to watch Into The Wild and read The Hunger Games before I go to Brunei. Cause (fuck) I just realised how tight the schedule is in Brunei. I mean, we wouldn't even be sleeping on beds for more than 6 days. So yeah, lots of jungle-and-me-lovin' time, won't get to read the book or listen to my MP3 in bunk I guess. One of my instructors said he had only four minutes to make calls throughout the entire trip. Naise. Ok, so I guess this is goodbye? See you in Christmas.

P.S. Have I told you that I've updated the playlist on this blog? Wellum yeah, so you can listen to it while I'm gone. Do anyone of you even still pay attention to that? Guess not anyway.

Life's too short to even care at all, uh-ohoh.

Sunday, November 13, 2011

in retrospect, at 12:35 PM

Think Young The Giant's going to become one of my favourite bands. Thanks to watchlistentell, Ivan and Nathan Hartono for finally confirming this for me.

Booked out yesterday at 11.20pm, the latest I've booked out. It's funny, cause we were really happy. We were supposed to book out today morning, then book in tonight. That's how the Army fucks up your mind. Sometimes, life does it this way too. Tell you you're supposed to get this unusual big shit, then force you to accept it, then give you a little lea way and you get fucking thankful.

This week was crazy though. I miss all you friends. I mean, these three weeks before we fly off to Brunei will be / was really crazy. I looked at the Infantry pro-term cadets in SCS, having FBO and outfield three times a week and I get scared. We basically have it everyday. Add in 2 hardplates, 2 softplates, 2 1.5 litre bottles for extra weight and I don't even want to hear an estimation of the weight we're having on our shoulders. I've broken my threshold this week, I think. I've pushed on when I was on the verge of breaking. A friend once told me cross-country runners have this thing called the mental pain barrier. Get running to a certain distance, you'll start feeling all the pain on your leg, the lack of breath, the fear of your body not being able to take it - but get past that, and your body continues on like clockwork, till it slowly breaks apart, but you'll still be running and running.

Anyway, I'm having a fever, muscle aches, sore throat, flu and phlegm. Was really worried just now because I know I'd really need the training next week. And all of them in Brunei. Just for JCC. I really can't wait. I was feeling a bit nervous, because of all the uncertainty I had about the entire exercise, but now that I've been through all the briefing and talks and mental preps (more or less), the nervousness seeped away slowly and what fills it up is excitement. I'm just now excited about all the abrasions and foot rots and all the bad stuff. Today is really just for force-prep; body recovery, buying all the necessary equipments and well, celebrating my birthday with my family. It makes it kind of sad - having a birthday cake early because you know you don't have much chance after that anymore, having a tiny slice of ice-cream cake because you know you're sick and you have to take exceptional care of yourself. Well, I've grown used to saying "such is life".

Brunei in close to a week. 3AM flight on Tuesday. Well, they can't even let us have a good, full breakfast on Tuesday.

But anyway friends, on excuse that it's my birthday (fuck that, I don't really care) care to strike up a gathering next week? I've Saturday, Sunday and Monday to make full use of. I don't need presents. Presence is enough. Oh wow - awww so, awwww so touched huh? Oh yeah, one more thing. JCC's so stingy that we can't even bring writing materials in. I mean, a notebook of sorts and stuff. Afraid we'll use it to get fire. Blasted. Thought I could do some "Into The Wild" thingum and reflect under all the complete darkness, alone under the canopy at night. Blasted. And then I wanted to do this thing whereby I collect some cool Brunei jungle shitzos in a ziplock bag and bring them back to Singapore and then make this super shitbangawesome thing (which shall not be explained, only shown when I'm done with it) but then it turns out they only allow us 4 ziplock bags, which has a use for each of them and zzz. I'll throw those in with my rubbish, I guess. Maybe not. But I'm pretty determined to bring them home. I'll show you the end product in a month and a half. JCC's 6 days of team navigation and 3 days of solo survival FYI, do note that I'm only excited about the survival part. 6 days of navigation in FBO with all the load? I think I'd rather not. It's a bummer though, cause a few batches ago, the survival phase was 5 days. Jizzzzzzzz///

24 days of Brunei starting 22nd of November, just two weeks away. Excited for the experience, worried about the heat.

Sunday, November 06, 2011

in retrospect, at 10:14 AM

In the naked heat,

Saturday, November 19, 2011

in retrospect, at 10:45 AM

JCCJCCJCC

Friday, November 18, 2011

in retrospect, at 10:23 PM

Life's too short to even care at all, uh-ohoh.

Sunday, November 13, 2011

in retrospect, at 12:35 PM

24 days of Brunei starting 22nd of November, just two weeks away. Excited for the experience, worried about the heat.

Sunday, November 06, 2011

in retrospect, at 10:14 AM

More About Me

Chew Bolong, Singaporean. Would have to emphasize on that point at times cause you're not exactly the first one thinking that my name's PRC. Oh, yes, my name's a Mandarin translation. Get on with life already. I graduated from Dunman High School, then Victoria Junior College and I'm currently spending the next year and a half of my life (brainless), in National Service. I have interests in designing and art [note: interest doesn't mean ability], (indie rock / folk) music, nature, long walks at night and making friends - sounds like a weird combination to say but those are things I associate myself to. I'm an ENTP but at times an introvert. I love deep conversations with people. I'm always in a dilemma deciding whether or not to change this description about myself, so I've decided that additional details shall be listed under.

27 Random Facts you HAVE to know about me

1. I used to suffer from insomnia cause annoying tunes would be stuck in my head or I tend to think through every event that's happened in the day, so I wouldn't be able to fall asleep. But in NS that doesn't apply anymore, cause I'm always tired. Don't think that's a good thing.
2. I like long walks alone at night, because it gives me a good opportunity to reflect, let my mind wander into deep stuff and just immerse in nature and the surroundings. That's provided the place I'm at is quiet and green. Yeah that's parks, garden, and most of Serangoon. Unfortunately, since NS, my mind's been pretty empty most of the time.
3. I told myself that by 37 years old I must have a (big) house complete with a billard table, a home-theatre system, a cosy round table and 4 armchairs in a corner of my (huge) living room, a secret hideout with natural lighting to chill and read books, a tiny bartender corner, a walk-in wardrobe and a useable kitchen amongst all other things. But my definition of future success only encompasses one thing - happiness. Yeah, it's a cliche but there must be a reason why it's a cliche right?
4. I enjoy people-watching. Behavioral science. You can actually tell a lot from that.
5. A part of my body I hate the most? My calves for sure. If you're a consistent reader of my blog I'm sure you would have heard of it already. But yeah, I'm standing at merely 165+ but I'd rather have thinner calves than be taller.
6. I (secretly) detest the Secondary 1, 2 me cause I was way too childish and immature. Not that secretive anymore, but I could have better spent that 2 years doing something else rather than doing lame things and attracting attention. I don't exactly like to mention this cause it's unglamorous, so lucky you.
7. I'm extremely afraid of cats. Like as if you don't know that already.
8. I can't take plain white bread. Nor powder formulated (warm) milk. They really make me wanna puke, cause they've that gooey feeling and they get stuck between or under your teeth. Which is disgusting. That's probably one of the reasons why I'm so short. I didn't know fresh milk existed when I was young, so I didn't drink milk for around a decade.
9. I find people who have good fashion sense and natural leadership emanating from them incredibly sexy.
10. I like girls with slightly reddish long hair and colourful sun dresses.
11. I have an inevitably heavy breathing, and it always gets worse when I start to notice it. Instead, I just reminded myself of it and am having a hard time trying to regulate my breathing right now. Plus I only breathe through my mouth. Although I've a big nose, my nostrils are probably small cause I have a blocked nose 24/7. BUT somehow when I fall asleep my body will force myself to breathe through my nose. Which is the reason why I snore in lectures. It's not even a snore actually - just heavy breathing sounds. I know I sound defensive right now. But no. True story.
12. I think the first gush of air from the air-conditioning system of a car is extremely addictive and pleasant. I'm pretty surprised some of my friends thought so too.
13. Crocs look ugly, but they smell really awesome to me. That fresh smell of sweet rubber. Everytime I walk past a Crocs outlet my heart melts a bit. No one seems to agree with me on this though.
14. The standard pen I use is a Pilot G2 0.5 ballpoint, and I write with such force on paper that Mr Ken Leong once commented on my essay: "braille?". The problem's so severe I need to use a cardboard piece (or a stack of paper of at least 5 pieces) as padding whenever I'm writing on paper. I switched to Uniball 0.38s in JC2. I am now using the Uniball to sketch as well.
15. I'm fully equipped in the skills of martial arts: junior black belt in Taekwondo as well as 6 years of Wushu. But I haven't even so much as laid a punch or slap on anyone. Okay I think I've slapped my brother a couple of times but that doesn't count cause I don't use my full force on him. One day I'd really like to try and punch someone. See if he even feel it hurts.
16. I'm guilty of judging people by a first impression (or just a quick scan). Don't everyone do?
17. Though I do say that, I find that my first 'evaluation' of someone is always pretty accurate. If I don't like someone, after time others will find it the same too.
18. I really like to whine and complain. I've been trying to tone it down recently because I realised that I feel better after I let it all out, but yet it only spreads the gloominess to my friends. I'd hate it if my friends were always whiney too, so I'll tone it down. I'll try.
19. I don't know why but I'm much more expressive online. I spill out secrets more often. I blog about things I don't even tell my close friends. So yeah, do read more when you still have the chance to. :D I suppose I'll stop blogging once I'm off the "student" label. Once I enter the workforce, when things are really so much more political and shit.
20. I've a weird habit of munching off the circumference of my burgers before I savour the centre of it. Don't laugh.
21. I have slight lisps. I wouldn't exactly call it that really, cause I refuse to admit it as a flaw, but pronouncing things with "esses" usually results in my tongue sticking out between my teeth and what comes out really sounds more like a "th". Yes, you can mock me about it for all your eternity of a boring, insipid life because I've came to terms with it. Booyah.
22. I believe that if someone isn't vain, he/she probably doesn't look good either. So yeah, come join me in being vain.
23. I'm quite a perfectionist about my companion, love and relationships, so I don't date easily.
24. I'm a huge nature lover. I want to walk Singapore's city at night with my friends. I want to camp under the stars with my friends. I want to live in the mountains without civilization. With a close friend or alone. My future half would probably have to love nature as well. Not like hiking-nature or climbing-nature, but really just the nature all around you. Even in the city.
25. My friend once said that I like to "fix broken dolls" as a boyfriend. In some ways it sounds apt, cause I think that girls with... a bit of emotional damage are deep and... more exciting to be with. I sound like I've dated before, but no, I've always been single. Evergreen, if you play that 'traffic light' game in University. Don't be weirded-out by me please.
25(ii). So yeah, if you're someone (or you know someone) who likes nature, likes long walks at night, likes folk / indie music, slightly emo / reflective at times but friendly otherwise, call me.
26. I listen to folk, alternative rock and indie music. I hate it when the artists I like gets famous and extremely mainstream. And that's not just a childish thought. It's because I think there's this special bond shared between you and the artist (and his / her music), and when it gets mainstream, the bond you had gets shared with all the other millions of people in the world, and it's no longer special. Kinda like what you'd say with relationships.
27. Finally, I fancy a good laugh everyday. My friends have given me that, and that's why I love them so much.

Not your usual Bucket-list

Yes, in order of 'want'.
1. 1 month backpacking trip to Europe / cold climate areas with a close pal (or two). The less civilization the better.
2. Is wanting something illegal illegal in itself? Yes, drugs - at least once. LSD, to be exact.
3. Making (good) friends with someone insane. I mean, mental. But I don't want to make it sound derogatory. There's something strikingly beautiful about insanity, like experiencing another dimension of some sorts.
4. The Killers' concert.
5. A folk / acoustic concert - say Iron & Wine, Bombay Bicycle Club, Inch Chua or Zee Avi.
6. Camping under the stars in the city (Padang?) and listening to acoustic sounds.
7. Experience the Glastonbury / Lollapalooza / Woodstock / Coachella festivals.
8. Bungee-jumping.
9. Scuba-diving.
10. Going for a real Broadway production.

I know - I'm weird, right?