My brother is enlisting for Basic Military Training (BMT) this Friday. Time passes so fast! Suddenly he’s on his way to being all grown-up. Often it’s hard to believe that I’m actually 5 years older than him. Afterall, he’s much bigger in body structure, looks older than me & definitely more mature than I was at his age.
But no matter, what’s the hurry to grow old? People age naturally anyway. In time we will all grow old. In fact, it’s surprising to see that most of my ex-CG friends (back at Christ Methodist Church) do not look older since the last time I saw them 3 years ago. But it was a great reunion that we had last Sunday.
Anyway, I’m very excited about my brother going into BMT. Whatever PES status, BMT is always an experience to look back & remember. Sometimes to smile; sometimes in grimace. If given a chance, I would do it all over again. Much differently perhaps.
Pre-BMT happenings
I remember the night when my Dad came home with several letters from our mailbox. One of them was for me. But it wasn’t like any other letter with my name on it. This one stood out because it had the MINDEF logo on it.
I can’t remember what I muttered under my breath, but it sure wasn’t anything that praised or celebrated whatever that’s about to engulf me when I opened up this compulsory military ‘love note’. I mean, come on… I had just finished my GCE ‘A’ level exams! What ‘better’ time than to receive such a wonderfully wrapped up ‘love letter’ from our beloved Army?
And there is was all green in color, waiting for me to tear off its paper dotted line seal & embrace its ‘exhilarating’ message with open arms. And there was the date… the date where I get up close & cozy with the other boys in green. 26th December 1998.
Wait… Christmas? No no… the day right after Christmas?! What the &^%$*$@??? How can they do this to me? Can’t I enjoy my last Christmas & New Year’s Day in peace & harmony? What’s worse, this date is only 2 weeks away! Oh boy… that really stumped me right in the head. Great… just great.
That night, I couldn’t sleep. In fact, before I even managed to get myself to lie down on my bed, I found myself pacing up & down my room for the next 20 minutes. How come? I don’t know… I just didn’t know how to work off all that anxiety… In fact, as soon as the fears & worries about enlisting into the Army got into my head, I began to forget about all the unhappiness about a possibly unhappy Christmas. I began to feel afraid. And I mean, really afraid.
I thought back to the few months back when I was told to go for my SAF medical check-up at Central Manpower Base (CMPB). I had no problems whatsoever, except for my very high myopia. My right eye was 1050 degrees & my left eye was 1250 degrees. I foreknew that this would be a real problem to pass me off as a combat-fit candidate & my thoughts came true.
But I didn’t give up. When I approached the medical doctor for my final round of check-up, I asked if my myopia is considered too high for PES A or B status. The doctor said yes & I tried to reason with him. I asked him what was the cut-off for PES B & the doctor said 1200 degrees. So I continued to reason with him, saying that its only 50 degrees more for my left eye & my right eyesight is less than that cut-off. But despite my attempts to convince him, he refused to give in. As a result, he gave me the PES C1L3 status.
I left CMPB with unhappiness inside my heart. I wanted to be put under combat fit status, so I could try for Officer Cadet School (OCS) to be an officer or at least SISPEC (School of Infantry Specialists) to be a Sergeant.
I knew I couldn’t be a Commando or Guardsman (though half my heart wanted to, even up till today which explains my occasional dreams about such things)… but just like almost every other recruit enlisting into the Army, I wanted to be someone ‘garang’ (i.e. heroic) & prestigious. The least of these two would be to in the Infantry. And all those Rambo TV shows that I have been watching since young didn’t help lessen this aspiration of mine.
I came home rather angry & made up a fuss about the medical doctor not giving me a chance to be put under combat-fit status. I reasoned that there is really nothing wrong with my body physically. It is just that I had high myopia. And according to what the doctor said, I didn’t really exceed the cut-off!
My Dad thought for awhile & decided to appeal for PES B status for me. But in the end, all of us let it be… coz no doctor is going to risk his medical license & reputation over a nobody like me.
Looking back, it’s just sad that I didn’t have a chance to even strive for what I wanted in my 2 & ½ years in the SAF. I didn’t even get a chance to take part & be tested in the Standard Obstacle Course (SOC). This course involves running a few hundred metres, then going through 11 different obstacles, before running the last few hundred metres to the finishing line. All in 10 minutes.
I was good at running & I grew even fitter after BMT. Even when I was in the Scouts in secondary school, obstacles weren’t really a problem to me. Many feared this obstacle course, but somehow even up till today, I know in my heart that I could overcome it… & finish well… if possible, really well.
So, I lay on my bed thinking & thinking… my heart & mind filled with mixed feelings about all that’s to come. I still recall very clearly that I borrowed my Dad’s army uniform & practiced ‘Change Parade’, where one has to change into army uniform in a matter of minutes. In fact, it had better be less than 2 minutes, if you want to be fall-in on time with the entire section downstairs. And mind you, I mean the full complete uniform. Everything.
So I practiced & practiced… again & again. Change into army uniform, then change back into my home wear. Change, change, change… always timing myself with my stopwatch. Change until I was sweating in my room.
On Christmas Day, Diana (my ex-girlfriend) invited me to a Christmas concert. As I watched the concert, my heart was pounding away, thinking about these last few hours that I have left as a civilian in society.
I don’t really wish to talk about Diana, but this point I must bring up because she did do something that made a whole lot of difference & helped me survive through my ordeal in BMT.
I remember that both of us watched the cartoon movie ‘The Prince of Egypt’ some time before I enlisted into BMT. And to help & encourage me when we were apart from each other, she recorded a cassette tape of the entire soundtrack for me, from her soundtrack CD. And till this day, the lyrics of the songs still speak to me, especially the song titled ‘When You Believe’. My heart always crumbles & I feel it squeeze inside, whenever I hear this song. Although I do not remember every single detail that happened back in the old Nee Soon Camp, the feeling has always stayed somewhere deep inside my heart.
BMT is one time that I felt like it was one of my darkest hours of my life.
I can’t remember if I slept well that night, but I knew I had to force myself to sleep coz I knew I wasn’t going to have much peaceful nights over the next 100 days.
The Day Has Come
Morning came & I got up, not really sure whether I had really slept. But it was time to change & leave for my ‘nice & sweet vacation at a residential 4-storey bungalow’ at a certain quiet corner at Nee Soon.
If I remembered correctly, my parents & I took a taxi there. During the ride, I was feeling all squirmy inside my stomach. The day had come. The time had come. This is it. This is really it.
As we approached the main gate, I saw that it was rather far off from the main ground of the camp. The taxi still had to drive for a short while before we reached the crowds of people all around the Multi-Purpose Hall (MPH). That was also when I realized that there was another definition for MPH, which isn’t at all like the all familiar bookstore with air con, books & all.
All new recruits were directed upstairs, while their parents remained downstairs. I had to queue up in a line to take attendance & be issued my new SAF 11B (i.e. my SAF identity card) in exchange for my civilian NRIC. At that moment, I didn’t know that it would be the last time that I’ll be seeing my cute little face on that little pink IC until the next close to 30 months later.
I was also issued my dog-tags (those two shiny silver metallic discs with the engraving of my NRIC number & religion on it). I have always hated wearing jewelry & although this is to be tied round my neck with thin black string, I still terribly disliked it. In fact, I never once liked it for the entire 2 & ½ years.
Upon receiving these items, I was directed to sit in the seats right in front of the MPH, where we had to stare blankly in wait for don’t know what. I was feeling very anxious inside & didn’t talk to anyone. In fact, there weren’t many newbie recruits that bothered to strike up much conversation with those around them. I guess many are just as anxious as I am… give & take a few percentages of worry & stress.
Right in front of us was this TV set. At first, it wasn’t turned on, so all of us were just staring blankly ahead of us. It was boring, but I didn’t dare to close my eyes to doze. Then as more recruits settled down, the TV was turned on & a short video was shown concerning what we would be going through over the next 100 days. It was a very short video lasting probably about 4 – 5 minutes… & it was replayed again & again, on & on… fully maximizing the usage of the repeat function of the VCR (at that time, I don’t think they had VCD players yet).
And this lasted almost 4 hours. Grrrr… what a ‘jolly’ waste of time! I saw some nodding away & after awhile, I began to wrestle to stay awake. Our stoning period ended when a soldier instructed us to go back downstairs to meet up with our parents. Right now I’m thinking – what the heck? Just gather all of us there for 4 hours just to watch some exceedingly repetitive 5 minute video? If I’m not wrong, I think I did record the time on my watch stopwatch function & I think the video lasted 4 minutes & 22 seconds. I can’t remember… but it doesn’t matter.
The Barracks
I met up with my parents & soon, parents were asked to depart and we had to assemble at our assigned barracks. I was assigned to Echo Company and my new barracks looked just as I mentioned earlier – a 4 storey block, with 4 bunk rooms on each level & a toilet near the end of the common staircase. Each floor was assigned to each of the 4 platoons – Echo 1, Echo 2, Echo 3 & Echo 4. In each platoon were 4 other sections.
I was in Echo 1, Section 3. Unknown to me then, but soon I found out that it was bad news. That means that my bunk was on the top floor (4th storey) & the 3rd room. Great… Just GREAT. Staying on the top means that I have to climb all the way up 4 stories each time & 3rd room means it’s nearly as the end of the top floor. Staying at such a high-rise level means it took much more time to scramble down to fall-in at the rough textured, cold-black colored car-park looking basalt ground assembly area. Great… I couldn’t be more ‘thankful’.
In each bunk, there were 15 beds. In which case, my section had only 14 recruits, so one bed was left unoccupied. Personally, it wasn’t much of a bed. I find it more like a thin white mattress laid on top of a hard steel braced bed frame. But it is afterall the army, so how comfortable would you expect?
Next to each bed was a black tall-standing tower cupboard for each recruit to keep his equipment & personal belongings. In the middle of the bunk, was a rather large brown wooden table with a few chairs (I think there were 4 or 5 of them). There were a total of 6 white ceiling fans above, in two rows of three.
I was fortunate to have a ceiling fan right on top of my bed, which is good, although the weather wasn’t as warm & humid as nowadays. The ceiling fans were old, which explains it base-sounded “Wooo” sound when it spins above my head. Afterall, we are the last batch to undergo BMT at Nee Soon Camp.
Rules: First Things First
Soon, our section sergeant came into the room & someone had to shout “Room!” & everyone will stand to attention next to their beds, regardless of whatever we are doing. Once the sergeant has given his instructions or scolding, he will say “Carry on” & we are allowed to return to what we were previously doing.
Our section sergeant was 3rd Sergeant (3SG) Ali. He’s says funny things at times, but he can get real nasty if we try to fool around with him. He began briefing us on the basics of bunk cleanliness & arrangement – from how to arrange the table & chairs, how to put our bed sheet and blanket (it was so thin, I didn’t think it was much of a blanket), how to arranging our things in our personal cupboard, how to place our combat boots, where to hang our washed clothes, when we are allowed to make phone calls, how to ask for permission to go to the toilet, lights-out timing, importance of shaving every morning, such that no hair can be seen on our face at all times, fall-in for water parade first thing in the morning, etc.
At that time, BMT enlistment dates were classified based on whether the recruits are from ‘A’ level batch or Poly batch. Mine was the ‘A’ level batch, so I knew that all of us came from a JC.
Buddy & Friends
Next, we were assigned our buddy. And mine was right next to me, on my left. He is Jeremy Leong, wore spectacles & he’s the biggest size in my section. I remember that he was formally involved in rugby & he had dislocated his shoulder several times since then. We didn’t click very well, but had to stick to it, no choice.
Next to Jeremy was this guy called Justin Khoo. At first we didn’t talk much, but through thick & thin, we became ‘informal buddies’ through the entire BMT. He’s a Christian too.
To my right was a quiet guy called Peh Wee Bin. He’s so quiet that we hardly talked at all for the whole of BMT.
My section was made up of very different people. There were people who were head-strong, then there were those who were rash in action, there were those who were quiet & there were those who were a mix of all sorts. I really didn’t know how we could gel together. Not that in the end we did, but I found a friend in Justin. Surprisingly, I didn’t get to know Sean Teng (because he was from a different section) till AFTER we left BMT. But we have been best friends till today.
The first few days was rather administrative & briefings, shaving our heads almost bald, assigning & packing of equipment, stores & all. And being 26th December 1998, it was only a few days before we were let out for a single day because of New Year’s Day. And that was the last time before it all began.
The Terror In The Night (& Day)
Echo 3’s officer in-charge was Lieutenant (LTA) Patrick Tan. Boy, I tell you… this is a face that both Sean & I will never forget for the rest of our lives. The cartoon character Duck Wing Duck called himself the ‘Terror in the Night’… but this guy, this stone-hearted, loud-mouth, rouged looking officer was both a TERROR in the NIGHT as well as DAY. Known to all & feared by all.
LTA Patrick has a rather odd behavior. Once in a blue moon, he will tell us crappy & sometimes dirty jokes. Once in many blue moons, he will show some sympathy & say a few words of encouragement to us scum of the earth. But MOST of the time, he’s a vulgar ruffian SPITTING out vulgarities & insults to all us low-down creatures on the ground, beneath him. Believe me… he terrorizes us & especially those who look blur & ‘guai’ like me.
The worst insulted & bullied recruit was Lu Rong Min. He’s a very smart guy from Raffles Junior College, but he’s so skinny with the biggest portion of his body being his head. Many tease & jeer at him, calling out “Pinky & the Brain!” That was one silly cartoon that was aired on TV during that time.
LTA Patrick didn’t like me either. I don’t know why, but in the beginning, I always & keep on having a tough time keeping still. I was very fidgety, yet I try very, very hard not to twitch a single bit when standing in formation with my fellow recruits. Whenever I twitch my nose or small part of my body, he will shout “Move somemore!” & stride right up to me & shout a whole string of vulgarities in my face. Because of this, LTA Patrick grew to dislike me from the start. Maybe he thought I was trying to play a fool… but I really wasn’t. I just find it so difficult not to move, when my nose is itchy, when sweat is dripping down my back & when mosquitoes bite me or fly around my face.
When Morning Comes
Every morning, we had to fall-in for water parade at 5:20am. Because of this, I had to set my alarm clock to 4:45am every morning. Thinking back now, I can’t imagine myself waking up at such an unearthly hour every morning! But trust me… the air is REALLY fresh at that hour. But the mood sure is not… for a brand new horrifying day of uncertainty has begun.
Yet I found one very strange thing that happened to me throughout BMT. Since the first night when I woke up when my alarm clock rang at that unearthly hour, I began to wake up on my own, without & even before the alarm clock rang. How I did it or how it happened, I really don’t know. But day after day, I began waking up before my alarm clock sounded. Maybe it was fear inside my mind that woke me up. I don’t know.
So after washing up, we had to change into our PT attire & fall-in downstairs with a full 250ml cup of tap water. Once ready, the officer or sergeant would give the go-ahead & we would have to shout “Drink!” & quickly gulp down every single drop of the 250ml, before overturning the cup & making sure not every a single drop of water drips out. If not, we had to refill & drink again… until not a single drop came out.
The Cookhouse
Then we had to march to the training shed nearest to the cookhouse, where platoon after platoon will line up in a single file, waiting for their turn to come to stand up & walk briskly towards the cookhouse for an early morning breakfast.
The waiting time can be from 5 minutes till up to 20 minutes. And I remember that this was the moodiest time of the day. That was when I look at my watch, stare up at the dark night sky & start counting down how many days left. I drew a 10 by 10 square box on the first page of my little black notebook, where each day I would cross out one box. Day after day I would cross them out… all the while trying hard not to focus on the huge mass of uncrossed boxes that made up the full 100 days.
We were given a colored chip each to drop into a steel box after collecting our food. It was standard procedure for every meal at any cookhouse in the army, not just in BMT. That’s the crazy thing about the army. Everything and I mean everything is about procedure!
Breakfast is usually light in the morning, either nasi lemak or mee goreng, along with two slices of bread with either kaya or jam, topped up with a cup of milo or tea with a fruit. It’s a healthy & balanced, but kind of gets routine after awhile.
Drawing of Rifles
After falling in & marching back to the barracks, we had to line up & sign out our personal rifles – the M16S1. ‘S1’ meaning the modified version of the M16 rifle which replaced the AK 47 rifle used in the earlier wars.
That is the usual time when I had to shit. So after rushing through the oiling of the rifle parts, attaching its magazine, wearing my uniform, Skeleton Battle Order (SBO), helmet & bayonet… I had to rush to the toilet to quickly ‘bomb’ before rushing out to fall-in downstairs again.
That’s when dawn breaks & it’s nearly 7am. That’s when the full day of training begins, with a mixture of physical training & lessons taught at our usual training shed. All the time, we had to run or march from place to place, without much rest.
Lunch Time Chin-ups
Upon lunch time, we had to gather in front of the chin-up bar, to do a minimum of 6 chin-ups before we are allowed to go for lunch. Each time we do chin-ups, it would be recorded & we are expected to increase in number of chin-ups over time & not allowed to go below our current number. A chin-up IC was required & Justin was appointed because he ‘gei kiang’ do 19 chin-ups during our first chin-up session before lunch. See… it doesn’t pay to act smart or show off in BMT.
Normally I could do 8 chin-ups, but because of the amount of training we were put through & the progressive increments in number of chin-ups over time, I decided to play it smart & begin to do only 6 for a start. I could go on after my 6th chin-up, but I purposely acted tired & failed to complete the 7th. But it was a good start… I mean, what’s the hurry… we would be doing this every lunch & dinner every single day!
Lecture Theatre
After lunch, we would fall-in again outside the cookhouse & march back to the barracks, stand there in the hot afternoon sun, sweating away, while waiting for a sergeant or officer to come out of their bunk & instruct us to go into the lecture theatre for theory lessons. Often, these instructors would purposely take ages to come out… taking their own sweet time after lunch, while us dogs sweat like hell under the burning heat.
That’s why it always feels like heaven when we enter into one of the lecture theatre because that’s the ONLY air con place in the entire camp! But that’s also one of the most strenuous parts of the day because we were all ‘shag’ (i.e. tired out) from the morning training & the heavy lunch comprising of more meat than vegetables didn’t aid us in staying awake as long as possible. Fail to stay awake & we would be punished & confined for the weekend if caught dozing off.
We were expected to take notes during the lectures, but many began nodding & falling asleep. Some tried to keep drinking water to stay awake, but as days go by, we found out that we shouldn’t drink too much because the officers will get pissed when you keep going to the toilet.
They kind of leave us little way out coz even drinking water can be torturous at times because the officer can disallow you to go to the toilet. Especially after you have already gone once earlier… & I don’t mean during the lecture. Sometimes it feels like we are only allowed to go toilet at very rare intervals, yet our instructors order us to conduct water parades every few hours.
Training Shed Sessions
After leaving the lecture theatre, hell begins once again when we begin running with standard battle attire from place to place, training shed to training shed for our next lessons or training. Many times, we just nod off even while standing up at the back of the training shed. Just like many others, you will soon find yourself standing up (so that you won’t fall asleep), holding your rifle in your right arm & your helmet with your left hand. As you stare at the officer conducting the lesson or training at the front, all of the sudden you hear a “Bang!” & you wake up realizing that you have unknowingly dozed off standing up & as a result accidentally dropped your helmet.
If the conducting officer is okay, he will close one eye coz you are already doing your best to stand up. But if he’s a sadist, push-up is the punishment to go for those who KO without even knowing.
Trust me, I have learnt that looking at your watch throughout the day doesn’t help one bit. But nonetheless, many people do that, wishing that the day would be over soon… even when it’s only past 4 in the afternoon & our normal (and I mean normal) day ends at 11pm. It’s ridiculous to keep looking at your watch, hoping & praying that time just flies away, but many still do it. And I’m one of the guilty ones.
Towards the End of the Day
As usual, chin-ups before dinner, eat then fall-in, march back to barracks & continue other training sessions till we finally gather in front of the barracks again at nearing 10:30pm for last briefing & night snack. That’s when each officer will brief their sections individually before coming back together to sit down on the basalt ground as a whole battalion for a final briefing about tonight’s time for lights-out, waking up time for tomorrow & a brief run-down of the next day’s programs.
Call it sadistic or whatever, but some officers have this bad habit of making us sit on the ground even when it’s wet from the rain. Even when they know that we only have 2 or 3 shorts or pants to rotate throughout the whole 6 days, they will still insist that all sit down immediately when he says “Sit!” Oh boy, I sure feel like a dog under his watchful ‘care’.
Bath Time!
Shower time. Once dismissed, every single recruit charges up the floors to their bunk to gather their clothes & shower items, before running into the toilet to bathe. Why? Coz we are only given 20 – 30 minutes to do everything before lights-out. And that includes packing & preparing your attire(s) & items for tomorrow. With an 89-man battalion & only 4 common toilets to use, guess how fast each has to bathe! Of course, it’s an open shower concept with no curtains or cubicles, but who cares! With an average of 1 – 2 minutes to bathe, you hardly have time to think.
Before Lights Out
The best part is walking back to your bunk coz your hair is so short that by the time you walk in, it’s dry! So each day ends with packing & preparing for the next day, making sure your boots’ laces are open & ready to slip in a single second, uniform is not crumpled, webbing items all in place, washed clothing hanged up, etc… then not before long, our sergeant comes in to declare lights-out.
It’s interesting… every night, all of us lie on our beds, thinking about this crazy day that has just gone past & for some (like me) trying badly to convince ourselves that it’s one day less to go through.
At that point of time, I decided to flow one paper star for Diana each night before I sleep, so over time I grew famous (or infamous) throughout the entire Echo 3, even though I didn’t even tell anybody. Even Sean knew about it when he wasn’t even bunking in the same room as me. Although some teased me, there were a few who found it a romantic gesture. One of them was Sean.
It was really quite an interesting experience to go through BMT. I mean, how often do we get to do be in the thick of such action? Only in BMT; or at most during reservist. It was really quite an adventure for me.
Physical Training
I remember those daily Physical Training (PT) sessions when we had to gather downstairs in our PT attire comprising of a sleeveless grey t-shirt, black shorts, white socks & PT shoes. Thinking back, it’s just so troublesome to wear white socks with PT shoes back then. Why can’t we just wear our usual green socks? Just because our PT shoes are white in color with partial blue stripes? Sigh…
As part of PT, most of the time each section would go in a rotation of different exercise stations. Exercises include push-ups, bench-dips, sit-ups, lateral raises, chin-ups, shuttle runs, etc.
Wait… it’s not over yet. Then we will have to assemble at the main field right in front of the cookhouse & prepare to do sprints. Normally, it would be a 100m sprint, followed by 300m walk. Then repeat again & again.
The Famous Hand Signal
LTA Rizal is good. He’s a very fast sprinter… overtook everyone when I saw him run. Looks faster than a horse! But his attitude is really stuck-up. Sean & I (and probably everyone else in our platoon) remember him for his famous hand signal, indicating us to “knock it down” (meaning to do push-ups).
Note – this is not part of the training. This is part of his punishments to us for all sorts of reasons he could think up. And there we are, in push-up position for don’t know how long, be it on the blindingly hot basalt ground or in puddles of rainwater. And we would have to count out-loud. Sometimes, or should I say often, he claims not to hear our counting, or our counting is not clear to his ears… & he would say, “Cannot hear! Start from zero!” And there we would go again… & again… until you can’t really feel your arms from all the ‘burning’ inside our muscle fibers.
And the best part – none of us can get up, until the punishing officer or someone else says, “Recover!” That’s the saving word that everyone’s ears wish from the bottom of our hearts to hear. Especially when we are not dressed in PT attire, but full combat uniform… & then you will know… & that won’t be any joke.
Monthly Counseling
This wasn’t beneficial for me & some of the recruits like Justin. Since LTA Patrick was our platoon IC, he was the one conducting this session. Most of the time, he would give me this erratic grin that sends me the signal that he’s quietly smirking inside his heart… obviously since he’s mistreating us on purpose & especially targeting some of us, e.g. me, Justin, Rong Min, etc.
What do you expect me to tell him? That he is a freaking terror in our low-down lives? How could I possibly tell him that? Most of the time, I didn’t say anything & just kept quiet. And I just hate that smirk on his face when he asks, “So do you have any feedback or complains to raise?”
I still remember a time when Justin & I were sharing our pain & struggles with each other & suddenly both of us started to tear. This was brought to the attention of LTA Patrick & he instructed us to come to his desk. And there he sat, looking at us with that smirky grin, then asking us what happened. Both Justin & I said nothing, then all of the sudden, Justin started to cry. His face turned red & tears began dripping down his face. I was stunned, but at that moment, both of us felt like complete losers, didn’t say anything yet already lost & broken inside.
Somehow my gut feeling just tells me that LTA Patrick was put here just to make our lives miserable. Afterall, Echo Company is widely known as one of the most ‘xiong’ company, alongside with Delta Company, which is located at the barracks just opposite us. Delta Company is famous for their ‘xiong’ morning PT. Their recruits were made to train like crazy & shouting at the top of their voices.
Sigh… so much for all this unhappiness. But I still find it a worthwhile experience.
The 50m Swim
I also recall that all of us are required to pass this 50m swim, in whatever stroke we can. It was so fun… just one swim & I passed straightaway! Happily, most of us stayed in our bunks during remedial swimming lessons for those who couldn’t swim or had failed. And those breaks were precious!
Individual Physical Proficiency Test (IPPT)
My IPPT was a breeze… coz I have always trained & kept myself as fit as I can during my school days. Without really much effort, I made it into Category A (i.e. Cat A) of the entire Echo Company, which means that this group of recruits are the best at running, normally led by LTA Reza. The other groups Cat B & Cat C will run at a slower pace behind.
I recall our first company 2.4 km run… I came in top 9 in the entire 89 recruits! And I felt really good about myself. Due to an incident of diarrhea, I was banned from taking the official IPPT test with all the other recruits… which was sad coz I really wanted to run with the best in our company. Raihan was the best, with the fastest 2.4km timing of 8 minutes 42 seconds. Shocking many of our sergeants…
Of course, when I was fit for the IPPT re-test, needless to say, I came in first in the 2.4km run. No kick. I have been a rather experienced runner since my secondary school days, so I didn’t ‘cheong’ (i.e. sprint) forward at the very start of the 2.4km run test. I kept it steady, at the middle of the pack & slowly moved towards the front. Towards the last few hundred metres of the trail, I had overtaken the rest & trying my best to keep up with one of the sergeants running in front of me. I didn’t manage to overtake him, but I did make a good timing for that run.
In fact, I have always advised those who are going to enlist into BMT, to train a lot on their running stamina because in there, being able to run without carrying any or much load is really seldom the case.
Most of the time, we are running from here to there with our SBO, rifle & all. And trust me; the helmet itself already weighs quite a bit. Wearing it on your head for most of the day during outfield training can be tiring. I remember my head bobbing from front to back, side to side, with the heavy helmet on, as I ran here & there during my 4 days, 3 night field camp.
Medical Centre Injections
Once a month, all of us recruits would be called to the medical centre where we will line up to receive an injection to prevent infections from rust. This was especially important before we begin going for jungle field camp.
As usual, I dislike needles. But this is not too bad, coz this was injected at our shoulder area, near the BCG childhood injection. Besides, it merely lasted 2 seconds before withdrawing the needle. So it wasn’t so bad…
Field Camp
Field camp was a dreadful, yet adventurous event for me. Dreadful because we had to spend a lot of time buying stuff, packing them into specifically instructed zip-lock bags, squeezing all the air out from these zip-locks so that we can fit everything in, then followed by a few times of full-pack (i.e. that green army backpack) item checks, where we bring down our entire full-packs, unload everything & squat there, only to pick up & raise up that particular zip-lock bag when called upon in order during the checks.
I remember that some of us tried to play it smart, by making our full-pack as light as possible. For example, one of our standard items was a full toilet roll for usage when we are out in the jungle. Thus, some of us decided to use 1/3 of that toilet roll, so that it’s lesser, yet not too small to pass off looking like a full toilet roll. I mean, seriously… unless you are having a really bad stomachache or diarrhea out in the woods, surely you won’t need to use that whole huge lot of toilet roll. In fact, some even dared to carry only half a toilet roll! The concept is simple. We will all be tired out during & especially after the field camp, so using up & discarding it is surely a good way of making things easier for our suffering backs!
Other things like toothpaste, we will buy those small tubes, use them then throw away. Afterall, it’s only 4 days & 3 nights! How much toothpaste would we require? Yet the heaviest load is actually our field combat rations. Each pack would weight almost 3 kg, enough to last a single person for one full day. I’m glad that the taste & variety has improved since I left the army (sadly, not when I was still in it). Not comparing with the food during my father’s generation, but even during my time, it didn’t taste good either.
Combat Rations
Vegetarian & muslim food aside, I remember that there were 3 different standard field ration packs – Pack 1, Pack 2 & Pack 3. Some say that Pack 3 tastes the best of the lot, but I never got the chance to try it. I only got a chance to try Pack 1 & 2, which tastes quite terrible… or maybe it’s just my preference about food. In my opinion, Pack 1 is the worse. Some of those who were issued Pack 1 began desperately trying to exchange it with someone else next to them.
For me, biscuits became my staple food every meal, over the next 4 days because I didn’t really like any other kind of pre-cooked, pre-packed & pre-preserved, cold tasting scrum that was included in each ration pack. But one thing I found very ‘cute’. Inside each pack was this little piece of white paper that stated a suggested guideline of what to eat for breakfast, lunch & dinner. I mean, come on! How many would actually follow that? Not me!
For breakfast, I would normally snack on the biscuits. There were only 2 small packets per pack, so I seriously had to use it sparingly coz I really didn’t like the rest of the food. As such, I would eat one packet of biscuits (comprising of just 2 small biscuits with a little cream in between). If my mouth is itchy, I would sometimes allow myself to be tempted to open up this small packet of Horlicks chewy sweets, just to add onto my rather dry & pathetic breakfast. But I didn’t mind, coz I didn’t want to eat too filling a lunch anyway. Not when we are running up slopes, crawling on the jungle floor on our bellies & all.
As for my breakfast drink, I would usually dump in the entire small packet of ‘Pocari’ isotonic drink right into my 1 liter water bottle, shake it vigorously up & down, left & right for who knows how long… before finally taking a mouthful to taste if these salty ‘particles’ have been dissolved into the water. Sometimes they don’t. Then it’s back to the old shaking & tilting routine, with whatever remaining hope that these ‘sediments’ would eventually settle & dissolve.
On the first day when we reached the site, lunch was delivered & we were all told that this is our last cooked meal for the next few days. After that, it’s back to those horrid tasting rations.
To much surprise, there is always this ice-cream man riding this trishaw-like bicycle, passing & stopping near us during our lunch time. Half my mind pondered whether to go forward & buy an ice-cream. But soon I found out that only officers are allowed. How discriminatory!
Lunch was light for me, as there were lots of running, or should I say charging around, up slopes, down slopes, hiding in long grass, camouflage ourselves with all sorts of leaves to break our human shape, leopard crawl (i.e. crawling on our belly), etc.
Dinner was slightly better because on the last evening, we were actually given one packet of instant noodles to cook using our mess tins & solid fuel. And boy, that tastes great! Nowadays one packet of instant noodles seem quite little to me, but back then… it was like one of the most delicious food out in the trees!
I’m not sure if I’m saying this right, but I noticed that the expiry date on my jungle rations were kind of outdated… by almost a year. It’s a dark green plastic wrapper so it’s difficult to tell whether it’s the manufactured date or expiry date. But either way, it’s dated one year ago, which can’t really be a good sign, be it the manufactured or expiry date. Whatever it is, the best yet odd part about combat rations is that eating them seldom makes you need to shit. I’m serious! At most, we urine a lot because we were told to drink a lot of water. But I only remember going to the toilet to do my ‘business’ once in that whole 4 days.
The Infested Jungle Toilet
Talking about the toilet… huh! Thinking about it would make me scowl. It was one of the most hideous & unhygienic man-made toilet that I have ever used in my entire full-time NS life in the army!
I had to go to the toilet one night at about 3 or 4am in the morning because of a sudden stomachache. As per procedure, I had to whisper that day’s password to the soldier on watch duty, so that he would let me pass. And there was only one toilet, made of aluminum steel & twisted at the edges.
Opening the door, I came face to face with complete darkness. But then again, what should I expect? We were in the middle of a relatively dense forest & it was 3+ am in the night. With a white shining full moon above, yet having the toilet shelter over me… obviously there won’t be much light coming in.
So what to do? For the first time in my life, I had to shit in pitch darkness, with the only small tiny beam of pathetic light coming from my L-torch, which I held in one hand. I didn’t even know what color was my excretion, or how much came out. I just wanted to get it over & done with, and get out of this insect infested area, with mosquitoes trying to bite me & a huge black spider hovering above my head. I can’t remember if I was wearing my helmet (I think I was), but it didn’t really matter. There was still this big black spider above my head. Argh!
The 60 degree Slope
To get to the top of this brownish & grassy hill to commence our field training, all of us had to run (at least for a few seconds before we start staggering) up this 60 degree inclined slope. Trust me, climbing up a slope of that incline is no joke. Not when it was more than 100m in distance to the top. And especially not when you are carrying your Full Battle Order (FBO), in other words - everything. I would estimated that our standard FBO could easily weight close or more than 15 kg… full-pack, helmet, rifle, magazines, boots (during my time, the combat boots were heavy, not like nowadays comfort Gortex boots), etc.
To make matters worse, someone had to drag up a fully filled up Jerry Can, i.e. a dark green colored water container that carried 40 liters of water. Don’t quote me on this, but I bet it weighed at least 25 - 30 kg. AND THAT PERSON WAS ME!!!
So there I was, pathetic Matthew… struggling, staggering & crawling step by step up this horrendous hill. My goodness, it’s only a hill & I was like breathless & ‘dying’. Don’t believe me, TRY IT. Don’t forget that I had everything on as well & I had to carry that seriously heavy Jerry Can with one hand, which left me only hand to crawl my way upwards. 100 over meters. 60 degree slope. TRY IT.
Needless to say, I was the last to reach the top. I still remember that all that dragging caused quite a pain in my backbone. I didn’t like the feeling, but not as if anyone cared… especially when I finally reached the top of the hill, with LTA Patrick shouting at me all the way. Come on, doesn’t he even realize that this damn water tumbler is shockingly heavy? 40 liters of water leh! I could drown him with that amount of water all the way from his throat till his anus!
Forgive me, I couldn’t smile then… for my back hurt & I was absolutely tired out… AND the field training is just about to begin… God help me… *Faint*…
Well, He definitely did… if not, I wouldn’t be sitting her in my nice air-con room now, typing this Blog entry.
Tent Pitching
Whoever gave the instruction to pitch our tents at that location was seriously out of his mind. At first, I didn’t think that it was that bad a place to set up our tents. Afterall, it had quite a large amount of open flat grassy land & the soil wasn’t hard. It was thought to be a good location, until that late afternoon when it rained.
Congrats, recruits! It is a water catchment area. Rain water poured down from the skies while we hid under a training shed… shocked to return to find our tents wet & muddy… outside & inside. In short, completely muddled up.
My buddy Jeremy couldn’t be bothered. But being a typical hygiene conscious guy (now soldier), I started tearing off piece & piece of toilet paper to clean up & soak up as much of the wet mud as possible. It took quite awhile, but what’s a few minutes of effort for a better night’s sleep?
Powder Bath!
Jungle nudity, that’s what I call it. Every man in the Echo Company stripped down to our mere underwear, awaiting instructions to pour powder on ourselves.
Once the order is given, we were expected to ‘powderize’ into ‘ghosts’. To be more specific, white ‘ghosts’. This means flinging, throwing & pouring as much talcum powder as possible on every part of our body, even including inside our underwear. Wow, I tell you… the cooling feeling just rushed to my head when the talcum powder fell onto my groin area. Woo Wee! Feels just like I poured that powerful snake brand powder onto that area… just that this SAF issued talcum powder didn’t smell like that brand. In fact, it kind of smelled like powdered chalk… the kind that our primary school teachers used to write on those black boards.
But seriously, it felt good & cozy after that when putting on a new set of army jungle uniform, commonly referred to as Number 4 (i.e. 4th type of uniform among the whole list of different types of uniform).
Individual Field Craft (IFC) was the main focus of our field camp.
Camouflage:
Camouflage exercise was fun, yet painful. Firstly, we had to use our pathetic camouflage crayons (can you believe, crayons!) to mark out a distinct distorted pattern on our face, so as to conceal our looks among the trees, grass & leaves. It was tough coz the crayons were easily breakable, yet difficult to color on the skin. And we had to do it for the entire face, neck & hands.
Next, we were given 3 minutes to use different types of jungle leaves to distort our human shape & shadow, hopefully making us less easily seen by the enemy.
Like I said, it was fun, because it was like playing ‘Police & Thief’ when we were still kids. Just that this time the thief isn’t running, but hiding. Painful, because 3 minutes is such a short time to camouflage our whole body, thus causing us to just grab whatever leaves that was available & stuff it into our jungle pattern uniform.
As a result, I scratched my fingers & palms with the thorns & pricks. Thankfully, I was rushing yet trying to be as cautious as I could, so the bleeding was little & minimized.
Situational Tests
This involved the estimation of physical distance from one point to another & shouting out commands like, “Enemy 9 o’clock, 400 meters”. I was good at this, thus scoring my only ‘A’ grade among all the other tests.
Observation Post
We were assessed based on our ability to stay camouflaged & hidden, while approaching a nearby enemy post using leopard crawl… then watching & gathering info about the enemy numbers, weapons, etc.
Jungle Traps
This is an exercise where we were to act like cockroaches, feeling our way above, right in front & near the ground for obstacles & enemy traps, during the day & especially at night.
Section Fire & Movement
Firing positions include standing, sitting & prone (i.e. lying down). In addition, we were trained in ‘buddy covering fire’ where one shoots covering fire, while the other runs for the next nearest cover, then vice versa.
Then we had to learn how to move as an entire section of soldiers in several different formations e.g. zigzag, single file, spread-out, etc. When ‘contacted’ (i.e. the word shouted out to mean that the enemy has begun firing at us), how we were to evade & run for nearby cover.
Facing Enemy Artillery
Obvious – quickly run in the direction of the enemy, since they are blasting in the direction away from themselves.
Firing at Overhead Aircraft
I find this exercise rather weird. We were told that when there is an enemy aircraft flying overhead, we are to lie on our backs & fire at a point 50m ‘sky distance’ in front of the aircraft, so as to make up for the time when the bullets shoot into the sky.
Seriously, up till now, I don’t know how to judge 50m of distance by looking at the sky… & neither do I have any confidence of shooting down an enemy aircraft with a few 7.56mm bullet rounds from my M16S1 rifle.
Grenade Throwing
This was fun, yet dangerous. An exercise that every officer fears getting injured by a negligent recruit who anyhow throw a live grenade. As a standard precaution, all those with medical history of sweaty palms were disallowed to participate in this exercise.
Of course, for those who are eligible, we had our regular training throwing dummy grenades that were made of hard rubber & blue in color. But holding a real grenade in your hands, twisting & breaking its firing pin & throwing it at a standing target 30m away is not an easy task for a first-timer.
I didn’t find it scary or difficult, but it was thrilling, especially after I have removed the firing pin & I knew that it would explode in less than 5 seconds. The usual words were shouted, “Grenade out, firing pin twist… <> …GRENADE!!!! One thousand, two thousand, three thousand… <> … Grenade exploded!”
Just like some of the first-timers, I missed the standing target by quite a few metres. But it was still only a few metres… means still quite close. And I’m not worried because a typical fragmented grenade has an effective range of 30 – 40m radius of damage. When I looked up from my brick wall cover, I saw this huge black patch on the grass near the standing target. That was where my grenade landed… and it was a really black spot… about 5m radius. Wow… grenades are fierce. Really.
Outfield Guard Duty
Wah, I tell you… I was so ‘sway’ to ‘genna’ guard duty on the last night of the field camp. Everyone got to have a good night’s sleep, but I had to wake up at 2am to stand guard at the ammo (i.e. ammunition) dump till 5am. I tried to act ‘garang’ (i.e. brave) for the first ½ an hour, then I got bored & tired as I merely slept 3 hours that night!
Since fall-in was at 6am, I decided to lie down & rest for awhile. And gosh! I woke up late! It was 6:15am when I woke up & everyone was already doing their morning rifle PT (i.e. arm & body exercises using our rifle as our weight). I was late! So I gathered my gear & ran towards the group, still looking blurry eyed & tired. As a result, I got severely punished & ordered to do 50 push-ups, 50 sit-ups, 50 star jumps & 50 jumping jacks. And that wasn’t all, I had to do ‘exercise change’, where the sergeant will shout, “Exercise Change!” & I had to change from push-up position to sit-up position every time he shouted that. And everyone else was watching this poor ‘dog’ suffering & panting like crazy.
The Exhausted Return
Our return trip home was sweet, as many of us dozed off sitting on the bench or floor of the 3-tonner trunk, still covering our rifle firing point with our hands, so that it wouldn’t hit against our chin.
Washing off the jungle crayons from the face was not easy. But with the help of some of those who had facial wash, it was slightly easier.
Confinements
In total, I had 3 confinements on Saturdays & 2 early book-in(s).
Back in camp, there was one day when I walked past a Platoon 4 officer who claimed that I didn’t shave that morning. I said that I did, but he insisted that I was lying because he could still see a little bit of facial hair sticking out from under my chin. When I checked, there was… but it was because I didn’t shave properly… & it was under my chin, difficult to see! So this sadistic officer brought me to my officer in charge, which was none other than LTA Patrick & that made 1 confinement that I had to sign in the confinement book. Nobody liked seeing that book, trust me.
I got another confinement for drinking water too slowly during water parade. LTA Patrick was watching us & he decided to confine the last 3 recruits who finished drinking last. I mean, come on! What’s this? It’s not like we took how many minutes to drink! And it’s one liter of water leh! I already finished it in 1 minute 23 seconds & I still got confined?! What’s new? It’s LTA Patrick.
I can’t remember how I got my 3rd confinement & 2 early book-in(s), but it was another of this kind of silly, out-of-the-blue & irrational kind of ‘reason’. Good that I don’t remember. Grrrr…
Despite these unfortunate happenings, something good came out of 1 of the confinements. Justin, as well as a few other recruits in my section was confined too. Must be LTA Patrick again, since there were at least 3 of us from my section.
During this Saturday stay-in, one of the confines began playing a guitar & singing songs, while the rest listened in. There was some chat, but mostly a quiet time together. The best part was that Justin & I began talking a lot more. In the middle of the night, both of us took a plastic chair each & sat right outside at our room balcony where we aired our washed clothes. There we chatted & sang Christian songs. He encouraged me with those songs & I won’t forget that. Sadly, we lost contact after all of us left BMT.
Route March
Water parade was a killer when in preparation for that day’s route march. We had water parade almost every 2 – 3 hours & it was one liter of water each time. Many of us struggled after our 8th bottle & some even threw out at the drains in front of us. Seeing that, the grills of the drains were automatically lifted, during our water parades for our final 10km route march.
Being in the PES C batch, our route march wasn’t a progressive 8km, then 16km, then finally 24km march in FBO. Instead, ours was a 5km then finally 10km march. Still, it was tiring & monotonous as we marched in FBO from the late afternoon till the evening, resting only for 5 minutes to drink water & shake off our legs after every 4km. Our terrain was a mixture of flat slopes, uphill & downhill. And I remembered that my knees hurt whenever we marched uphill. Afterall, I had knee injury before.
Trench Digging
The aim was to dig one shell scrap & one command post that took hours, especially under the hot sun.
Sadly, I wasn’t permitted to participate in this all-day activity because I was down with fever. I took two Panadols & tried my best to persuade 3SG Ali to let me join in, but he refused.
Live Firing
This is something that I began being very terrible at it. All of us had to start shooting in the live firing simulation range, where simulation M16 rifles where used to fire laser shots at targets on a computer screen. I was absolutely terrible at it & never passed any set of firing exercises before.
However, the real live firing was a different thing. Although I began as a ‘Bobo Shooter’ in the beginning; i.e. someone who just cannot hit the target, thus referred to as ‘Bobo’, the name of a circus clown.
I normally failed the day firing exercises by a bare few successful shots, but I always made up for it in the night firing shoot. Don’t know why, but I’m just very much better firing at night.
It’s surprisingly odd, coz it’s so much darker, though the first bullet of our total 4 rounds in each magazine, was a tracer bullet which emits a bright red line of fire, tracing to wherever we had just fired that first shot. So once you see that your tracer round had hit the target, you just hold your rifle still, breathe normally & squeeze off the remaining 3 rounds without much movement. That was how I could score between 17 – 18 successful shots out of 20. And I finally passed!
That’s one thing fun about this – you get to fire live rounds at a moving & hiding enemy target. Ear plugs are important & I learnt much lesson after firing my first shot without first putting on my ear plugs! That shot went “BOOM!” & my ears were left ringing for the next few minutes. I seriously wonder how it would be like, if we were really in the middle of a war. Wear ear plugs how to hear clearly? How to listen to instructions when there’s so much firing everywhere?
But that’s the fun part. The boring part is the waiting because ‘detail’ by ‘detail’ (i.e. the term used to refer to a live firing group of soldiers) are one by one called out for their turn at firing. There are a lot of weapon checking procedures, before firing procedures & after firing procedures. Thus, waiting hours can last from 3 – 4 hours at each time. How boring… Waste of time… That's not the end. After packing up, clearing the compound of all used & unused bullets, weapon clearing, etc... We will begin our 3km route march back to the barracks... singing ridiculous BMT songs as always.
Battle Innoculation Course (BIC)
This is by far the most interesting & challenging part of my BMT. It involves moving through obstacles made up of rubber car tires, then having to use our rifle bayonet (i.e. the knife) to strike at standing targets using head butts, slashes, etc. It was aggressive & fun!
Then we had to assemble at this rather deep canal & begin doing leopard crawl towards the barb wire obstacle in front, then do back crawl with our rifle pushing up to prevent the barb wire from cutting us or getting caught in our uniform. Oh, I forgot to mention that all these time, there will be a machine gun firing above our heads. We were not allowed to stand up because if we do, the bullets might hit us.
As if that wasn’t tiring enough, we still had to do leopard crawl for quite a distance before getting up & charging towards this last standing target to strike it hard a few times with our rifle bayonet. Reaching the canal at the other end, that marked the completion of the BIC.
Passing Out Ceremony
I must say that I was rather disappointed in our Passing Out Parade (POP) because we trained for hours in the hot sun, doing foot-drill & it ended up raining & we didn’t get to march or whatsoever. All of us merely stood at attention for almost an hour, just waiting for all the parents to arrive & sit down at the back of the MPH.
In fact, it was so uneventful that I can’t even remember how it lasted & ended. I only remember three things that happened.
Firstly, I tried to do something sneaky on the last night before passing out the next day. At about 10:30pm that night, I crept through the night shadows towards the medical centre & bought a ‘Cornetto’ chocolate with vanilla ice-cream from their vending machine! Then I crept back to my bunk, showed it off to my section mates & quickly went to the toilet to finish eating it. Hahahaha… it was such a thrilling moment for me! Breaking rules can be so fun at times! Afterall, it was the last night before release from BMT.
Secondly, a few recruits & I were called to do guard duty on our last night. It was sad because I couldn’t spend the last night chatting with my bunk mates. And it was our last night together as Echo Company! So while they were asleep, I was standing as a sentry for 2 full hours at the main gate, right in the middle of the night, holding a baton & shield made of strong bamboo cane. I mean, what kind of shield is that? And it was extremely boring… Felt like a sentry standing still outside the Istana.
Third & lastly, I remembered that after the ceremony, my parents & brother took photos with me at the stage after most have left the MPH & went downstairs for a small meal of the catered food. Then we took a taxi home. And that was the end of my BMT. Quite happening… all the way till the end.
As we didn’t have any block leave, all of us had to return to camp on the Monday after the weekend to receive our individual posting. I was posted to Ayer Rajah Camp as an Automotive Vehicle Technician for ‘A’ vehicle (i.e. tanks). But that’s another story… =)
