my.escape

lunes, noviembre 28, 2005

[ 1028. Endex Report ]

I am pleased to announce that i'm finally ready to present my endex report - almost. I still haven't found time and energy to locate my camera, let alone transfer the photos to my hard disk, let alone do the usual photoshopping and let alone... post them. But meanwhile, just read on if you want to, otherwise i've got links to tons of my friends' blogs if you are interested.

Ten of us in the air comms team. The usual makeup: 1 comms o, 1 comms wo, a handful of specs and a handful of signallers. Just the ten of us setting up that many, many, many requirements for this year. Just one week into the exercise, my vehicle (there were two vehicles for us) got into an accident, which was caused by 'lack of experience of the driver and the veh comd'. Nonetheless, that effectively rendered half the team out for almost a week, and the other half had to work doubly hard, fourteen-hour days just to meet bare essentials for that week. Personally i had a mild concussion which resulted in an unsteady gait for a couple of days, as well as a numbing headache nearing a week. Since then, i was back to normal, and you could see that through my lame speech which never fails to irritate the hell out of da-jie.

Well, things got on the way and fizzled down by week three, and the rebro shift system kicked in and the exercise just carried on as per normal. Did a total of 6 shifts over 17 nights in all, including the last night which i went up to tear down the place. Detesting the idea of spending the nights alone at the rebro site, i grew to love the place, lazing on my hammock during the day reading my novels, and sitting by the side of our campfire at night, waiting for tiredness to kick in. Days grew increasingly interesting as each shift i took, as a different group of people would be up there, hence, for the sanguine me, means more friends to crap with. NSmen were undoubtedly the most hilarious and happening bunch of people you'd find up there. Especially those from 23sig spending my last 3 night shift with me, time really flies and gosh, it was the best outfield experience i ever had. Well, i didn't have much outfield experience to start off with. Muahahahaha. Those bunch of dudes (oscar, kenny, chuntat, kajun and some others) were like the perfect mix of people: the brainy, crappy, quiet, insightful, blah blah blah. There was this night that we spent crapping around the fire (like we always do) when we were talking about our personal views upon pre-marital sex and co-habitation. Kajun and myself both don't believe in pre marital sex, but he will cohabit, whereas i won't. Somehow, those peeps actually managed to convince him that it's a dumb idea if you cohabit and yet not indulge in pre-marital sex, and then now he believes in pre-marital sex. Geee. Today's kids. Bah.

Ok, i take that back. I'm still a kid too.

The trip wouldn't have been more enjoyable personally if the team make-up was different. Seriously having a couple of people on the team was a bummer. But well, life's like that: i can't choose who i want to work with, i can't decide how they behave, i can't determine how they'll treat me, i can't change their perception of me. In short: i'm not god.

Bummer number one: my roomie. That bugger who moved in after my first roomie was sent home due to the injury on his leg (as a result of the accident), is such a stingy fellow. Thankfully, he was the other guy who was rotated with me to man my site, so in short, when i'm in town, he will be talking to the mountain gods. According to his resident off day companion, he always refuse to go window shopping with him, and scrimp and save whenever he can. Nothing wrong per se. But the uglier side of it was that everytime we share stuff like dinner, he'll help himself to a very very generous portion, almost linear to the word greedy. That very fact puts people off. At least, it puts me off. and My other roomie off. I walked into the room one of the last few days, only to find that the floor area closest to his bed being very neat and tidying, and all other trash were being piled to the small little passageway at the foot of my bed. What a ugly singaporean.

Oh, ugly singaporean. Which brings me to bummer number two. One of the last few days (25th nov to be exact), before we sent off the two 1sig guys at the airport, we wanted to bring them to this hog's breath cafe to eat. Alas it wasn't open, so we just popped to hungry jack's (aussie's name for burger king) for lunch. This spec, went to toilet and found a wallet. The owner came popping back to the wallet and hunted for it to no avail, so our guy noticed it, did a quick identification and returned him the wallet. In gratitude, the aussie gave him two hundred bucks as a reward. And case closed. Not yet. Three minutes later, the aussie came back into the fastfood joint, and looked for our guy who by then was announcing his windfall to the team. (Not much of an announcement, but more like we found out.) The aussie said something like, our guy could have just kept the wallet and not returned him, and for his honesty for returning everything intact, he deserves all the money in the wallet, and with that, he handed the bundle of cash to our guy. To my astonishment, our dear friend asked him, "you sure?" and the guy said "yeah." and our friend just pocketed the money. Social norms rule no. 2874 states that we should decline unexpected rewards initially, accepting it only after confirmed insistence from the source. The pushy transaction should takes its pushy course for a pushy number of times, before one should accept. And gosh, the sum wasn't small: it's a whole six hundred aussie bucks. Say i'm envious or what, but definitely my first feeling wasn't green-eyed, but more of disgust. Ok, next point. Social norm rule no. 2915 states that after a minor windfall, it's obligatory for the person in question to give a treat, or at the very least, offered a treat, even if we do decline. Nothing of that sort happened.

Well. The third bummer is too long to be published. And with the first two, i have had enough reasons to look forward home on the 27th. Thank God i still had lionel and calvin there to accompany me for the bulk of the exercise. Thanks dude. ;)

Oh yes, we're going thailand next year. And jetstarasia is offering an offer! Muahahaha...

Shannon left at 2:50 p. m..

domingo, noviembre 27, 2005

[ 1027. 8 Hours ]

8 hours to home. Relieved or otherwise, i guess it's that bit of both. It's good to taste laksa and mee pok once again, but of course, at the unbearable cost of the weather and my run-down air-conditioning at home. Looking forward to getting back to office, only to know that my days of being there is numbered and tangible by now.

Lots of experience to say, and millions of words to show if every picture was indeed worth that thousand words. Lots and lots and lots of whinings and exclamations to make for the past 46 days...... So well, looking forward to Quantas sending me home......

And will i come back to australia anytime soon? that i don't know.

Shannon left at 11:03 a. m..

viernes, noviembre 25, 2005

[ 1026. Coming Back ]

44 days in aussieland. I'm coming back. 3 days and counting down.

Shannon left at 6:41 a. m..

gone.

will i be back?
i don't know.
maybe i've started elsewhere.
maybe never. again.

lunes, noviembre 28, 2005

[ 1028. Endex Report ]

domingo, noviembre 27, 2005

[ 1027. 8 Hours ]

viernes, noviembre 25, 2005

[ 1026. Coming Back ]

the guy

his wishes

his horizons

people.

tags

gone. will i be back? i don't know. maybe i've started elsewhere. maybe never. again.

lunes, noviembre 28, 2005

[ 1028. Endex Report ]

domingo, noviembre 27, 2005

[ 1027. 8 Hours ]

viernes, noviembre 25, 2005

[ 1026. Coming Back ]

the guy

his wishes

his horizons

people.

tags

gone.

will i be back?
i don't know.
maybe i've started elsewhere.
maybe never. again.