____T.H.E. .P.A.S.S.

21:39
Sunday, April 25, 2004

____Report to LTC M** On Recent Happenings

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Sir,
My report shall include the past 3 days' happenings and also the movement observations of my OC.

Friday - finally a day we can officially call our off day. It has been tiring and non-stop mindless working. The ever-evasive OC has finally revealed the work timing despite his previous shirkings from the topic on days-offs.

Previously, he typically gives the excuse that he works 7 days a week. Of which, 5 of them will be reporting in the afternoon just in time for lunch. Weekends will be a different case. He arrives late in the day until when it is time for his subordinates to be released, he holds a dumb and lengthy meeting talking about nothing except nonsense and of course, reminding us again that he works 7 days a week. I do hope, Sir, that you will look into this matter, and bring up his early retirement in the your next "across the board meeting" for the sake of the SAF.

Saturday - I reported to camp early to help out with some work with my camp mates. After which, I went to do some work out at the gym before realising that the LCD of my mobile phone has spoilt. One of the little medium of contacting you is now being put on hold. It is difficult now to give you hourly SMS reports. Thus I do hope that a monetary claim can be made to fix up my mobile such that reporting to you can be an easier task. Of course, a brand new multi-function with high resolution camera mobile would be best suited for the task. As such, I seriously propose that this matter should be brought up during the board meeting too.

Sunday - Reported 3 minutes late to camp, Sir. However, do not fear, for not only the CSM did not find out, the objective, OC, has not reported too. Has been busy with the usual work apart from the spying. However, I must put in a word for my 2IC for he is really hardworking - a workaholic i must say. He took the men for 3 full hours and prevented their early dismissal.

Yet, Sir, this seems more than meets the eye. Being very capable, almost too capable, I feel that there is a underhand plot masterminded by the 2IC to upsurp your position. In any case, I feel that this thorn in the flesh must be removed as soon as possible to prevent unecessary problems especially that late release of the men.

In view that 2IC loves running during lunch hour, may I suggest, Sir, that the best way to do so is to charge up the heart-rate monitoring handles of the treadmill machine during lunch hours with 100 000 000 volts of current, on my duty day. It would be simple as in my duty report, I shall list it down as a short circuit and that the treadmill is to be replaced.

Give the idea some serious thought, Sir. It is better to lose a good treadmill than losing your job and position to somone more outstanding than you.
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Currently Feeling Like: Off-focused Rio Ferdinand (Man Utd)

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22:11
Tuesday, April 20, 2004

____Up Down, Up Down, Upside Down

It has been a great day today for me. The day I came to realise the beauty of precicion passing. It was as though all the fairies were showering us with luck and divine ball skills, our passing and off the ball running was at the top of the game. That was when the phrase "up down, up down, upside down" was coined. We passed the ball up and down and turned the opponent upside down.

Deciding to discard my usual dribbling style, I adopted the passing and off the ball running style of football to perfection. This style suited to Wilson's passing game and Bruce's one touch game. Combined with my tireless running, our team was a formidable force. A force so strong, we were hard to withstand. Eng Kiat could only look upon us in awe.

This is my best game of football in Bedok so far. I hope there are more such games in the future.

Currently Feeling Like: Robert Pires (Arsenal) playing the passing game to perfection. WOooo!

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21:51
Wednesday, April 14, 2004

____Can Run But Can't Hide

While I have not been playing football since last Thursday or so, I have been busy with camp stuff. Not the kind of stuff that can really be called busy. It is more of the kind that occupies time and seeps energy away. Stuff like area cleaning, listening to my CSM talking for hours in the morning, conducting IPPT, and time spent in just slacking around. Football has not been much of a feature. I will not get much chance to play anymore since my ORD date is coming, I do hope I can get to play soon again.
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I have been kind of lucky in the SAF, getting to be a PTI and all that. It has been and enjoyable time. Even after passing out from the PTI course, life has been rather slack and even though there were tough times, busy times, exasperating times, exhausting times, things were rather easy.

Since posting to a newly opened IPPT centre, amount of projects that were tasked to the NSF PTIs have increased by a few folds. Projects are tough in a way because, sometimes the information needed were not readily available, as well as the absence of required equipment.

I remember one job tasked by my 2IC around this time last year, when I had to seek help from all over the camp to settle it. It was tiring and even though I managed to complete it well on time, appreciation was not really shown. Not that I minded, just that this sort of changed my mindset about going all out to do my job. Thus, when my friends and I were beckoned to join the AHM team, I agreed rather readily. Not that I had a choice, I just wanted to get away from the projects from a while at the expense of the chance of not playing football for a while.

Upon returning from AHM, my mind had nothing but ORD and football in it. The thought of completing my national service made me all the more intent to avoid "arrows" from the various regulars. Being naturally gifted in the art of "smoking out", I managed to evade my way from the "arrows". My friends and colleages were not so lucky though. That did not stop me from helping them. I made a point to do odd jobs, small tasks, and conduct IPPT whenever some of them were busy. I try also, to be the first few to initiate daily tasks that were to be done such as area cleaning. I felt I did my little bit in helping the vocation and unit.

Things were going great and ORD was approaching. Unluckily, the new SAF work year coincides with my ORD date. With the new work year, more news tasks had to be done. RT will be kicking off soon, and OC started firing "arrows". This time, there was no escape. He, assuming the role of an onlooker in the gym, sneaked up, caught me off guard and planted the long spear into my back. Blood spilled.

I begin to realise that there is no hiding from the man. Fortunately, the task is rather a straight forward one. I would say I have completed around 60 to 70 percent of it, just that I am not too sure if I have done it right. But, it is beyong the point. No job submitted to OC is right the first time. There is always a level of dissatisfaction.

I will be handing up the task end of this week. I hope not much change is required to correct it.

Currently Feeling Like: Alex Ferguson (Man Utd) requiring to meet the transfer dateline to bag a top player.

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14:24
Wednesday, April 07, 2004

____Three Days' Rot

Rotten, decayed and manifested by worms of all sorts. That is me. Wrong move to take three days leave in a row. So out-of-sorts and mentally tired. Luckily today is the last day of the three days' rest.

Perhaps the Singaporean mind has evolved too much from the rest of the world. We like to indulge in mindless "doing something". It is very difficult for us to stop and take a rest. Not to mention sit down and think. I look at some of my friends' lives. Too filled with activities, too filled with crests from an action-packed living, such that it has become a plateau of mindless "doing something".

Yet, it is the kind of live that I would pursue provided I get away from this permanent lethargy. At least, it is better than sitting in front of the computer all day long finding things in it to do. Maybe it is a good way to get some rest from exercise as I realised that I have been involved in too much running and football that injuries have taken their toll. Mentally, it may not be the best thing to do, but physically, I probably need it. The feeling I am going through now would likely be the feeling a professional footballer would go through if he was sidelined due to injury.
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Have started on this book by Dr Charles E. Watson titled "What smart people do when dumb things happen at work". I have only gone into the introduction and I realised that maybe my thinking have been wrong all the while. It is a thinking related to the success of a person. While it is a personal thinking, I feel that it represents the typical Singaporean's thinking, because, this kind of thinking is imprinted in me by what I see, hear and learn from living in Singapore.

The book promises tips on coping with problems in work that hinder the route to success. The author has interviewed and conversed with many CEOs of large American firms, including Ford, HP, blah blah... In the introduction, he offered 13 gems of wisdom - 13 gems characterising the behavior of "smart people". Even though the 13 gems are simple and probably the layman like everyone else would know, it is a relieve to have them layed down and elaborated. People of lesser patience would have shut and thrown the book with disgust before reading until the final gem, thinking "I already knew all these, why is the book still telling me what I already know?"

As the author elaborated the 13 gems, "success" is a word commonly brought up, but while many of us related it to the amount of money earned and the rank of authority in a company, the author prefers to relate success to the amount of satisfaction a job gives to an individual. This is where I feel that most of the Singaporeans have their thinking wrong.

To them, success is all about making money. To me, it was the same too. However, I must thank the author for enlightening me. To achieve success, is to believe in what you do in your job and to be proud of it. I read in the papers yesterday that MediaCorp actor Chen Hanwei may leave the company and join MediaWorks. The reason he gave was "If you work in an environment without passion, you'd feel like you're just handing in your homework when you work." I begin to understand his idea of success too - to gain satisfaction from a job.

Though it is difficult to change a thinking overnight, I will try to remind myself in future that I must not be a person who only pursue monetary success. Only through pursuing job satisfaction would others appreciating you. Only then, would a life be as fulfilling as desired.

Currently Feeling Like: Ronaldo (Real Madrid) sidelined with injury.

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15:21
Sunday, April 04, 2004

____Observe, and Put Things Learnt Into Practice

Whoa! I am getting lazy. I must say it IS hard to maintain a blog. It has become an obligation to "entertain" my invisible readers every other day but I must apologise to my loyal invisible readers for the recent inactivity. I have no excuse for this and certainly no reason. Life has been okay the past few days and I would not say I have been too busy to put in an entry.

I am still nursing my injured left shin incurred from last Sunday's Parry football experience. The person who came in hard must have had shins made from iron. I wonder if his still hurts today, but mine do. I will still make an effort to go to Parry to play football there because it gives the "training ground" feeling. But for today, from the looks of the weather, I doubt there will be "training".
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I look approximately two years back in time on the fateful day, 25 January 2002 and realise that my term in the SAF is coming to an end. I still remember I had to blink back tears when I was told that I were to defend my country. Not that I did not know beforehand. Just that some of the initial ceremonies were grand and solemn. Somehow facts hit hard, the pledges and vows were full of pride and emotion. Anyway, I realise, over time in the SAF, how crappy SAF can be. However, I will not go into detail of the incidents that make me think so. Instead, I will make an observation between the army working life and the coorperate world working life.

I woke up on Friday morning feeling great from the rest from work on Thursday (I took leave). And since Friday was my off day, I was relishing the fact that I have another day to slack at home and rest a bit more. The itinery of the day was the usual play computer games, lunch, sleep, play games and dinner, television, play games, sleep... Such was the luxury of a free day.

Of course, things do not always turn out as expected. Free from the army, but not free from my dad. At around 1000 or so, he called home to summon emergency worker - me - to help out at his factory. Since I was free on that day, I had to oblige. Afterall, it is a responsibility and the family business is the source of income that made me live 20 years. I have to admit I was pissed and irritated that my day's plans were ruined.

As I rushed out of the house, I began to see some similarities between this incident and the army. I was on recall! I begin to groan at the thought that I was virtually serving NS two times over. But, I thought again and told myself that it is all part about being responsible for the things that one has to be responsible to. I consoled myself with the fact that I am still quite reliable.

It did not take long to reach the factory as it was a single bus ride all the way. I was immediately put to task by my dad. The rest of the morning was spent rushing, doing odd jobs and packing goods and stuff. All the while when my body was busy, my mind was comparing this work at the factory and the work in camp. I had to note two points.

Firstly, the workload is tremendous. I see my dad rushing here and there, answering calls, giving instructions to me and the other two Indian workers, and also doing his work. It was not the first time I realise that he had been slogging away for the most of his life. As an odd job, I was not spared too. I had my fair share of work, no doubt less skills required, but still time consuming. The feeling is totally different from that of what I do in camp. My unit is a service sort of unit, dealing with NSmen, conducting IPPT and RT for them. Things are not so hectic in camp, but the tick-offs were certainly neverending. Which brings me to the second observation.

National Service is sort of a forced obligation. Nobody likes doing it and the worse thing is the politics that come along with rank differences. The NSFs were doing exactly what the NSFs think - serve and get lost. Thus, sometimes it has made most of us wonder the quality of the work done in the SAF. Minus the minority of those who are really nice people, like Fadzrun, in my camp, the rest, including me, had the NSF mindset. The explanation I heard once from one of my campmates, who like me is going to ORD, was that the work that we do in the army, had nothing to do with the later part of our lives. At that time, even though I was silent, I begged to differ. But on Friday, I realise that there was some truth in it. The work I do in camp did not matter to me, but the work I do at my dad's place was important. Not only did it ensure the smooth going of the production process, it also is important because it is the family business. Thus, the attitude towards the work there is much more enthusiastic.

Of course, behind all the crap and shit, the army has taught a lot of things in the background. It is only a matter of individual to pick up these important lifeskills. For me, one of the skills that I notice all the time is time, or rather, the importance to meet datelines and targets on time. I feel that it is a very important skill to learn because that ability to react quickly to changes and still meet the time target is one of the assets that my father possess and is one of the lifeskills that gives him an edge over his competitors.

It might seem amazing to be able to pick out the many things that army can teach but it is all about observing, sitting down and thinking about it. Now for the portion of putting things learnt into practice...

Currently Feel Like: Thierry Henry (Arsenal) wanting to go out onto the pitch but is being benched by the coach.

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____T.A.G.B.O.A.R.D

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