In Continuum.

Many Meetings

The thing about morning traffic that drives people mad the most is probably the fact that every single juncture or avenue possibly available would be blocked out by cars after cars, fender to fender and blowing exhaust gas into each others' windshield. The problem with traffic is not an exclusive issue to any country, and even in sunny old Singapore, it happens. Cars eager to squeeze into the littlest of spaces in between other cars, and none of the drivers are willing to give space to you or be courteous about it. Horns blare in the morning expressways, and the customers inside the cars would be left like an ant on a hot pan, desperate to get to their workplaces or schools in time only to meet with another red light or another irresponsible road hog. To make things worse, some idiots can't keep to their own lanes and accidents happen - like yesterday morning while I was desperately trying to get to school in my parents' car, driving at ridiculously low speed against the mud flow of traffic beyond. It was nerve-wrecking - at best.

Stumbling out of the car and over the overhead bridge, I rubbed the knuckles into my eyes and felt the sleeplessness from last night seeping through my cornea. Insomnias and schooldays do not marry at all, and there I was in the slight cooling drizzle of the morning, too tired to wake up and to fall asleep at the same time. It was a constant battle of dilemma in my head as I made my way to the same lecture theater and found a seat at the very front of it. And like all the orientations I've ever bee to, nobody ever wanted to sit with me unless no seats are left and/or you are late. There I was alone with the whole crowd of newly formed gangs behind me, chattering away in their endless words swarming around the atmosphere. There I was, writing about Stanley's death in my most horrendous handwriting yet. But I guess it didn't matter then, with the sound of Philip Glass in my head and the emotional condition in my head, I wasn't ready to negotiate with my fingers to write in a better handwriting anyway. Who the hell writes a diary in the middle of a lecture hall anyway? I reckon, only myself and myself only. Not a great start to everything indeed.

Things changed when we were first divided into our orientation groups, and it was a very simple system to start with. Basically, we numbered off from 1 to 14, repeated that until the last girl at the top right of the theater, and they paired all the numbers up. So people from Psychology, Communications and Business were all jumbled up together in a group of about seven to eight, and with our orange t-shirt clad OGLs we made our way to the venue of first contact.

I recognized the male OGL from somewhere, and I later found out that 'Clemz' was from NYJC as well. His face looked awfully familiar, and for some reason I just knew right there and then that I've seen him before. And as usual, the circle in the group was wide apart and large. Everybody was sitting far from one another as if we all had some kind of deadly virus or plagues. But of course, as the person who never supported the idea of forced socializing, I talked first to the people to my left and right. Jeremy's striking blond hair came to me as rather radical at first, especially in the contrast of his not-so radical face. Not to say that he looks horrendous or hideous in any way, but he just didn't look the type who would have his hair turned into a dull shade of gold. To my left was the soft-spoken ShiYi, reserved and controlled. She was from SRJC too, and we talked about the teachers that were there and the ones that left. So it was a good start, just writing our names on musking tapes and sticking them on our arms and chests. So it began, the orientation that so many of us would eventually dread in the end.

Boys, being boys, connected very well with the mentioning of National Service. Everybody just started talking about where they were from, what they did, and of course the funny stories that happened in their own times. Jeremy was a signaler, who picked up calls in the offices and occasionally visited the fields once in a while. Ben was an armorer, who checked rifles and guns only to fail them in cleanliness after spotting a mere dirt in the holes. Brian was an armor infantry just like me, and because of that we became very close army buddies...outside of the army, ironically. There were three other group members as well: Joyce, Cassandra and Felicia. Joyce - as I later found out - is a girl from BeiJing, and came to Singapore at four years old. Which was a total surprise because she didn't have that China-Chinese vibe going on at all. In fact, she spoke mandarin exactly like an average Singaporean - though with the problem of reading numbers in English, which I thought was cute and funny. Cassandra looked a little too old to be with us. In fact, somebody from the other orientation group later guessed that she is 31 when she is actually just 25. Reserved, unsure and uncomfortable, she was quiet throughout most of our conversations. Felicia looked the type who wouldn't participate in activities initially, the type who is afraid of the sun and the dirt. But as I later found out, she is one of the coolest girl I have ever met. Period.

The buses were loaded, and I took the backseats with the boys at the back. And throughout our journey into town for our orientation, we had much fun talking about the army and taking random pictures with the OGLs I knew and the ones I didn't know. The need for new friends finally exploded on the bus and I started talking random people, asking them random questions and then stemming our friendships from there. I wasn't exactly sure what they thought about this junk speaking man, but at least I had fun making a million new friends. That felt great, really.

The first stop of the orientation had us in the Mindcafe over at Princep Street. Initially, we picked off the games from the shelves ourselves, but were later ushered to the front of the shop for a group game instead, involving the games provided. First it was Jenga, which had the lot of us really paranoid and tensed up because we were all competing with the other groups and desperately trying to build higher towers. But of course, a mid-height tower is always better than one that is super-high, because the latter will eventually collapse and not the former. We adopted that strategy, and managed to keep our tower standing till the very end until the other towers came crashing down along the pull of gravity.

Next was my favorite game of all-time - Taboo. And as the avid fan of the game, I was asked to be the first person to describe the words. And as we all took turns to answer them, I was amazed at the words people could come up with. I mean, Felicia actually knew Chris Martin and who his wife is. Joyce knew an alien word 'Emu', and there were other crazy words. But we all got disgustingly excited, and the atmosphere in the Mindcafe went completely over the top. That excitement was of course, accumulated and snowballed to the next game...though I forgot the name.

Basically it involved each group sending a representative as the 'actor' to express the given emotions. The group members would be given a list of emotions initially, and from that list everybody would guess which is the right emotion performed by the actor. And if every group decides to have the same answer, then the group that the actor belongs to will get the points along with the groups which guessed correctly, something like that. And because I was thought to be 'The Most Expressive' by an unanimous vote from the group, I volunteered myself up to the front.

My word was 'Suspicious', and that took me a while to get into people's head. I actually paced around the room unlike any other groups, and managed eventually to perform the act by sneaking up to people and whacking them on the back with sponge sticks. All the while, I had Gollum from The Lord of the Rings in mind, and all the time trying to imagine myself half naked and dressed in a rag just like him. I'm not sure if it was my bad acting, or because I did too many things for people to guess accurately. It took everybody three tries to answer correctly, and somebody initially wanted to guess 'crazy', which...could have been the case now that I realized. But anyway, at least the majority of the groups guessed it correct, and I was awarded with 'Best Actor' of the whole game, and received a bag of chocolate hazel nuts. Not bad for a first impression. EVERYBODY remembered my name, everybody referred to me as 'The Suspicious Guy', and people came up to me saying Hi when I had no idea who they were. Oh my, I'm not sure if I am ready for that kind of attention.

Then, the games around the town started. It involved a lot of running, and more running, a lot of embarrassing acts in public, forfeits, and doing all those under the dreadful hot sun in Singapore is not the greatest and most lovable thing in the world. I shall not go into details about the games or tasks we had to do, but basically it involved me and the others running like mad dogs all along Orchard and doing crazy tasks like, attracting the attention of strangers by doing a bunch of weird acts, being in push-up positions while somebody counted the chairs at Spinelli, asking the service counters as to the number of washrooms in Plaza Singapura, looking for phrases like "I need a handjob" under toilet seats in Park Mall, having our faces vandalized by lipsticks, vandalizing others' faces with camo cream, stuff like that.

It was fun, but at the same time really tiring. By the end of the games, everybody was worn out and tired, smelly and sweaty. As I am typing this entry right now, my legs feel like they just had a bloody route march, and the sore sensation creeps up my spine every single time they decide to move. It's not a pretty feeling, and the feeling sure wasn't improved at night when we engaged in other activities which I shall elaborate in the next entry.

Though our team did not win the whole games, we weren't the last five teams to make it, which means that we didn't have to do forfeit. And the biggest relief was probably because of the fact that we actually anticipated our eventual defeat. So to have our team number not called out at the end of the night was a great feeling indeed. Besides, as much as sympathized with what the losing teams had to do, we were glad that it was them and not us, drinking those filthy juices and doing all those retarded acts. But of course, those will be further elaborated later.

I have to say, that I love my new friends. ShiYi, you are probably the bravest girl I have ever met. I mean, she went on the night walk later on at night despite certain issues, and eventually finished it without a scratch. In fact, she was the first girl to embark on the journey, while Brian and I followed closely behind. Brian, like I said, you are my army buddy outside of buddy. It is a truly great feeling to have a friend from the same vocation as yourself in the past, and it was great talking to you about it. Jeremy, it's great to have you as my Communication Studies friend, and we clicked instantly despite our many differences. Joyce, a girl who plays the guitar can't be bad at all, and I like how composed you are and how we clicked so very well - like the people with the rest of the group. Also, the fact that you knew 'Emu', I'm still very much surprised by that. Felicia, the coolest girl I have ever met. Any girl who listens to Steve Vai, knows Jimi Hendrix, hates techno and hip-hop, does Photoshop and has a common appreciation of things is a good girl on my list. Besides, she is the undisputed Queen of Taboo. Amazing stuff she did there, guessing. And as for Cassandra and Ben, to be honest you guys were too quiet for me to know you guys very well. But hey, we will get the chances I'm sure. And until then, thanks for being part of the group. You guys were all great.

Many meetings yesterday, and I am thankful for all the new friends that I made along the way. The daunting feeling of this new life left me, amidst the laughter and the conversations that we had in groups and with others. ShiYi, Felicia and myself have made plans to go to school everyday together, and I suppose that is a good start to everything, right? To more beautiful and fun days together, through the thickest and the thinnest - cheers.

(I didn't have time to take pictures with Cassandra because my bus came. The morning pictures were taken after the orientation, after a night of no sleeping at all, while the last three were taken last night before Felicia and Joyce took their leave. Which is why in the first few pictures, we all look kind of dazed and confused.)