In Continuum.

Battle Royale

Battle Royale is a Japanese movie of a different kind. It is about a school teacher bringing a bunch of Japanese high school students onto a deserted island with remote controlled bombs tied to their necks. Their order is to kill each other until the last student left, and whoever that does not comply to the order is going to have their heads blown out of their bodies. This started even before Hollywood got involved with all the blood and gore that they seem to be so obsessed with these days, tagging it with the horror genre when it really isn't about blood and gore at all. Battle Royale is really the father of this sort of movie, but it is not one of those brainless movies out there that deals simply with cutting people up - or cutting yourself up. Anyway, Battle Royale was exactly what happened yesterday at Jonathan's birthday party out at Orchid Country Club. Instead of trying to kill each other with our bare hands and butcher's knives, we attempted at that by wielding paint guns in our hands, all the while trying to dodge paint pellets that were flying through the air at 300km/h. Suddenly, the movie's not that terrifying anymore.

Jonathan's birthday is coming up only in a couple of weeks, but he pushed the celebration forward because some people is going to leave the country soon. So the lot of us gathering at Yishun MRT at noon yesterday, and we made our ways down to the Orchid Country Club, where the paint ball field was right next to - our battlefield. Jeremy and I were there first in his car, and the two of us found a random bathroom in the club house meant for the golfers, and emerged out with our army uniforms. The both of us felt incredibly embarrassed, especially for the fact that I was wearing a pair of old running shoes and he was in a pair of slippers. A day after the national day celebrations, we weren't giving a lot of pride to the local army. But we cared little about the curious stares from the aged golfers, and made our way down to the field as well. It has been a while since I wore my green uniforms, and something about seeing me in the mirror in green again felt strange. However, it turned out to be a smart choice, because everybody came out from their cars and taxis in the very same wardrobe.

Everybody was wearing their old army uniforms, and some of them even came with their army boots polished. Kevin looked as if he just came down from the national day parade yesterday, and there were others with their boots wore on their feet completed with the green socks and garters. These were just some of the things I armed myself with: The standard green uniform, P.T. shoes, workout gloves and knee guards. I was prepared to take a lot of serious damage to my body then, and the fact that they didn't have groin guards worried me the most. I mean, the constant reminder from the owners there that the pellets travel at 300km/h made me worry about our private parts, considering the fact that it'd be the only part of our body not properly covered. But I figured, as I sat there under the tree with the boys, it didn't matter too much anymore. Once the pellets start to fly in the air, everything would go flying out of the window - or over the fences.

We were given a briefing before the game actually started. A form was filled up before anything happened, and it was like a public declaration of sorts, telling people that we were here on our own accord, and our death would not be the responsibility of the people working at the tag paint ball games. We followed this big guy called William into the middle of the field, and he started going through the rules of the games. Five person aside, each team would try to shoot down two orange colored targets on the other side of the battlefield. In the middle of the field is a no-man's land, and there'd be a box of ammunitions for you to take. You can only take the box after you shoot down the targets, and you have to grab the box and run back all the way to the end of the field to get the win. So with the rules laid out before us, the tutorial for the gun started.

With the gun comfortably propped up against his shoulders, he started launching shots at random targets on the fields. Something about the flying pellets scared me more than flying bullets, simply because bullets don't usually fly at you on training fields. Those pellets were going to be flying towards me, away from me, between me, next time me, above and below me all at once once the madness begins. Something about being in the midst of it all scared the wits out of me. Anyway, there was a tint of excitement mixed up with my fears, and with all the rules down and the demonstrations done, it was time to get down and dirty.

The first round of battle was between group one and two, and the battles started swiftly after the alarms were sounded from the center of the fields. The teams both rushed towards the center despite the pellets that were already raining down on each other. Everybody looked like Darth Vader without his black cape, running about with their guns and hiding behind wooden crates and plastic barrels on there. There was a person however, who distinctively stood out from the rest of us by his craziness on the field: Kevin. Kevin ran, Kevin jumped, Kevin flew, Kevin proned, Kevin crawled, and Kevin rolled on the muddy floor just to get to the bridge by the side of the fields. By the time he finished his stunts and tricks, Jeremy was already on the middle of the bridge, waiting for him to arrive. Two shots to his chest, and Kevin was forced to go back to the medical hut before being revived. This time, Kevin was less on the theatrics, and rushed all the way down to the side of the bridge, not remembering that Jeremy was still on the bridge then. Spotting Kevin squatting next to the bridge, Jeremy landed another two easy shots on Kevin, and that sent the spectators into a round of roaring laughter.

It was my turn to get myself killed by a hail of pellets. With the body armor on and the mask put on, we walked in a line with the guns in our hands onto the fields. The man in the middle asked us to pull away the rubber stoppers at the muzzle, followed by the switching of the safety button. With the alarms blaring in the air, the lot of us dashed towards the middle of the battlefield. I took my place on top of the sniper tower, and started unleashing pellets at everything that moved on the other side of the field. I saw my pellets flying with pathetic accuracy - since they don't fly straight - and saw other pellets flying towards me at the same time. Cheryl was trying to murder me from her corner, and it made it extra difficult because she's so petite in nature. The first round ended with Jonathan's group winning swiftly against mine, with one member short and a member down with a bad flu - Kania.

The games continued as usual, with Kerri hidden behind the crates most of the time and the rest of us getting hit in the faces and bodies with those pellets. At 300 km/h, those pellets felt like flying marbles all of a sudden - as if they weren't hard enough to begin with. Once hit, there'd be a string of vulgarities escaping one's lips, and it wasn't difficult to understand why people would do it. I was hit on the inner thighs and arm, with one of them hitting me straight in the face mask, covering half my view. Not only does it not feel good being hit, the paint that splatters all over doesn't taste good either. But the adrenaline rush throughout the game prevented us from feeling any of the pain until after the games, and it was just a whole lot of fun out there on the fields, finally having a good reason to kill our friends. At least it was way more realistic than those firing practices in the army; at least this time, we got to shoot at real moving targets instead of wooden boards with a cartoon figure painted on top.

Jonathan went crazy the moment his game started. Wearing only a singlet, he walked with his arm outstretched, firing the paint gun as he walked without protection whatsoever. Being the only visible target, everybody started raining their pellets on him. We called him Robocop after the game, but it was much less glamorous after seeing his wounds. Halfway through the game, he just wanted to get the hell back to home base, with the pain starting to become excruciating at some point. But the games ended sooner than the pain began to register, and it was all for the fun of it anyway. My group came up again, and there was a particular game I remember when I was in the middle of the field shooting down targets. I was supposed to be the sharpshooter of the team, and I stationed myself at the closest possible crate out there, and started to take down the orange targets one by one. After the second target was down, I signaled to my teammates that it was time to proceed with the next mission with two fingers stretched out at the end of my arms, like a victory sign. Only, a pellet came flying in between the two fingers and hit smack in the middle of it. And sorry to Antoniette about the ass, I didn't mean to shoot you there.

By the end of the games, everybody was covered in both paint and pain. It was my first time at paint ball, and it sure was quite an experience for me out there, shooting at my friends for a good reason this time. Don't get me wrong, I don't have a personal grudge against anybody on the fields then. But there is just something about shooting people with paint ball guns that was so thrilling. I bet everybody shared my sentiments then, as we claimed the wounds on our friends' bodies to their own names. We were on the verge of autographing the wounds, but I guess we ended up taking pictures of them. I claimed the wounds under Jonathan's armpits, because I distinctively remember seeing my pellets travel through the air and hitting him right between the part of his body that wasn't covered by the body armor. But what the hell, somebody shot him anyway - and it was all great fun.

After the battle royale, the lot of us made our ways down to the bathrooms. Shem, Dominic, E-Fei, Jeremy and I found a bathroom in the corner that was supposed to be used only by the golfers. But we crept into them anyway, and it was probably the best public bathroom I have ever been to. They had air-conditioning in the showering room, a pair of slippers in the corner of the bathing cubicles, and even had hot water to boot. I don't even remember getting that sort of treatment at Raffles Country Club, and I remember telling the rest how much better the bathroom was compared to the ones I have at home. Anyway, the lot of us cleaned ourselves up, and met up again at the driving range to have our class booked while we decided on where to go for dinner.

In the end, the centralites dominated over the rest, and we ended up eating at Chomp-Chomp, just around the corner from my place. I swear, the seafood dinner was probably the cheapest and best seafood dinner I've ever had. Maybe it was because I was incredibly famished, but I cared little about that as well. Once the stingray and the humps began to arrive, I couldn't stop moving those chopsticks. One by one the shells were opened, and the juicy flesh were stuffed into my mouth. There was little time left for talking at all, and that was how it went throughout the night. We spent the rest of the night at Deuel's, playing cards and singing karaoke at the top of our lungs. The Mafia game was brilliant as well, and we had a lot of time manipulating people. I was killed a dozen times, simply because I was wearing white. And Naz was accused of being the Mafia a dozen times simply because - as he claims to be the reason - he's Malay. Anyway, we ended the games by midnight, and I was thoroughly tired by then.

Still, after the paint ball, the seafood dinner and the gathering, my holidays were off to a great start. At least it wasn't spent at home, sleeping away and in front of the computer. Not that such a lifestyle is not welcomed by me, it's just that I've been craving for some difference, and Jonathan's birthday party must have been the best party I've ever been to. It was painful - literally - but it was just brilliant altogether. I guess I have to give credit to the company, because they were just a bunch of crazy people to be around with. I'm not sure when we are going to have another paint ball gathering, or another gathering for that matter. But I am going to look forward to that day, because they are just too fun to be around with. Now, back to the life idling at home with my aching muscles.