There are many different views from people of how National Service changes the life of a Singaporean male. Two years of running around in with the most durable set of clothing any of us will ever wear, and under the effects of the 'Z-monster Disease' (the urge to fall asleep instantly when you put on your no.4), not forgeting the 'bang bang!' and 'you die you die!' while running around with Singapore-made plastic guns like little children and not feeling ridiculous.
Me? I like to think that no matter the consequence, at least I can look back at my time in the army and smile at the times I've had lived in a little compound just on the side of Changi. Look back and remember the times when we were recruits, crawling around in urine soaked mud or having everything in our cupboards emptied out into a bag and high kneeling with that bag over our heads. An instant from the cold, wet and miserable times in Brunei. The never-ending feeling of 72 km route march. The pure torture of 5 km SOC. And, the 2IC who always like to torture us with power run and 3km run training.
But it is all worth it when I was standing proud in front of my parents, grandparents and other audiences, receiving my Red Beret and Stiletto knife.
Time flies. It crawls by like a snail when you're NSF, but when you look back it seems like it was just yesterday. The receiving of my pink IC marks another new dimension of my life. School, the one thing that has been a constant in my life for the past 22 years suddenly seems like a completely "stranger" to me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying the Army is starting to look better and better after all those tough training. What I am saying is that it's going to take a while for a fresh undergraduate like me to get completely used to the idea that every situation I encounters, every action I takes to overcome that situation, is a direct consequence of my very own decisions. No more just blindly following orders. No more 'aiya, OC/CSM say what, we just do what. mai kao bei kao bu'. No more simply ending up in the guard room on a Saturday night just because I screwed up by kena extra.
I suppose another thing that's constantly on my mind is how the hell I'm going to survive after no more receiving of my monthly pay. Sure, the army pay isn't exactly that great. At my pay of $720 per month, that works out to $24 a day, $1 per hour. But, that's not peanuts. It's $1 an hour to spend most of my time sleeping, swimming, sun-tanning, running, watching TV and eating those free meals from SFI. Most importantly, you don't even need to care about fashion sense, when you're wearing your no.4 or the admin brown tee everyday. My mum and dad have promised me of $200 bucks per month, with meals and transport included. Well, I suppose I could prefer to always carry my mess tin and a couple of packets of instant noodles around in my bag like what I did in Army. After all I have become somewhat dependent with instant noodles when I was hungry. Or even the bak chor mee, nasi lemak and dessert from the Changi Village auntie, and the MacDonald which deliver to the doorstep of my hendon guard room.
'Get a job la!' That's what my friends always said to me. If it were that easy, I would stop hearing about the financial problem from every university student I meet.
These days, more and more people are taking up all sorts of exercise programs and getting more health conscious because of one simple reason. In the real world (meaning outside of the army), you get fat and weak. The state of having far too much time on your hands, and way too many makan session of unhealthy foods.
So here I am at the crossroad of transforming from a NSF to undergraduate, it's not that easy as I thought, but it is who that I am going to be for the rest of my life. Therefore, I believe it is really time for me to change my attitude and of course, get back my fashion sense.
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