Stories

At the End of a Day

When the trinkets and treasures we so fervently sought
seem to have lost their novelty and become merely
trinkets and treasures.

When our precious thoughts we so wanted to tell and write
suddenly seem, too sacred and profound to ever exist
beyond our unfathomable minds.

Then for what did we struggle through it all?
We return stumbling, out of the bush,
worn and weary,
empty-handed.

To sit round the warm orange embers
on a fine Autumn's night
because we'll have Stories to tell.

A friend of mine had this concept, which brought him through many tough times. I tried putting it into words.

Empty words

I'm back from Taiwan and my course is as good as over. Usually at this time, people would be expected to talk about experiences they've had and the things they've learned. But I can't help but feel that throughout these weeks, I've lost more than I've gained. And I'm not talking about money. Or my weight.

Perhaps things are catching up with me now.

Though I know that evenin's empire has returned into sand
Vanished from my hand
Left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping
My weariness amazes me I'm branded on my feet
I have no one to meet
And the ancient empty street's too dead for dreaming

-Bob Dylan in Tambourine Man

A Firing Of Blanks.

Prologue

The mid-afternoon sun pierced through the canopy of the rainforest, cunningly snaking its way through gaps and openings of the branches and leaves in which its scorching beams shone through. The bed of undergrowth baked under this heat and released its moisture into the air. Quite content with this change of state, the vapour found no reason to trouble itself by trying to break out of the canopy and neither did it care that it was getting crowded.

The sound of crackling leaves and rustling bushes intruded into the cicada's song as a section of soldiers wrestled with endless entanglements of root, vines and the occasional rogue bush. Every few steps, one of them would mutter a curse, either at a thorny branch or the ridiculous heat. On the map, it had seemed like a simple patrol mission from point A to B but just an hour into it and any semblance of morale was already non-existent.

Body

Almost there, said the sergeant for the fiftieth time now. We're almost there. He knew that his words were of no comfort to the men, but what else could he do? More beads of sweat trickled down the side of his forehead and he paused for a second to wipe it with his sleeve. His cheek hurt a little from the rough fabric of his fatigues. The men behind him leaned on the trees, panting.

The surroundings bore little hint of their location but he noticed a strip of sparseness in the canopy ahead, telltale signs of a track. Finally. Fumbling with his side pouch, he managed to pull out his map with some effort and confirmed that there was indeed, a track ahead. The track in fact. The one that would get them the heck out of here.

The men groaned as he gestured to them to move on. Almost there, he told them. This invited more groans. A few minutes later and they came out, almost stumbling, onto a dirt path. The point man was dead for a good five seconds before anyone realised that the deafening rat-a-tat was actually machine gun fire. Strangely, no one really seemed to care that one of their best buds was gone forever and that they were down to six now. The only thought on everyone's mind was: This is it, this is it.

The sergeant was prone on the ground, eyes desperately scanning the grounds to attain some form of situational awareness. His first thought was of Hendrix, looping the Machine Gun riff in his head. They had instinctively fallen back into the bush now to take cover. The dead private still lay on the dirt path, a mess of blood and guts. Machine gun yeah, tearing my body all apart. There they are, the bastards. On the other side of the track, vegetation was sparse and about a hundred meters away he could see the muzzle flash of the machine gun.

They were pinned down and the enemy was closing in on their hiding spots as more and more bullets whizzed across their heads, shredding the leaves and bush around them. Bits of branches and leaves poured onto the men's helmets. Cries of fear came from the men around him as they hid their heads and waited for their turn to die. Pile on suppressing fire! he shouted to them even though he knew it was pointless. Gunfire was so intense that they could barely raise their heads without losing it. And then, silence: The MG was reloading.

Without thinking, he ordered the team to charge and they complied with surprising quickness. The same way you shoot me down, baby you'll be going just the same. Across the dirt path, through the forest, they ran even after the MG had reloaded and was continuing its sweep. He saw two or three of his men stumble and fall, either by bullet or branch, but his eye was focused on the MG team, which had now come into view. The second-in-command and automatic gunner had already gone in by the left flank and were unloading their rounds on the enemy. One was already dead on the ground while the gunner was still pivoting the machine gun from side to side on the tripod, desperately trying to clear the advancing section.

As he closed in, he raised his rifle and took aim at the closest soldier.

Evil man make you kill me,
Evil man make me kill you,
Even though we're only families apart.

He squeezed the trigger but all he heard was a click. Alas, his rifle was jammed.

Epilogue

The forest was still and silent except for the sound of party poppers. A section of soldiers were formed up in a line, furiously firing blanks, straight ahead. Once in a while, the sergeant would shout for his section to advance and they would get up and run to the next tree or bush.

A corporal watched the blade of grass in front of his muzzle sway back and forth as he unleashed a torrent of carbon gas onto it. The grass nodded in agreement. Unseen to the him was a wild boar sleeping in a nearby bush. It rose its head for a moment to observe the commotion, then went back to digesting the half-eaten combat rations it had found strewn on the ground earlier this morning.

One of the men could be heard cursing as he lugged a humongous tube on his back that was the anti-tank weapon to the next position. Throwing the tube on the floor, he collapsed clumsily behind a tree and continued his firing, which did not happen till more than a minute later when he had finally extracted a round that was stuck in the chamber using his bare fingers, for he had forgotten to bring his jack knife. At times, an awkward silence would be heard when all of the weapons malfunctioned or ran out of ammo at the same time.

When the whistle was finally blown, the men wearily dragged themselves towards the sergeants position where they would evaluate their "performance". Ostensibly, their faces were expressionless but it wouldn't be wrong to call it a look of boredom, vivid and pure. Anyone else forgot to bring anything? asked the sergeant, who had just finished reprimanding the anti-tank gunner for not bringing his jack knife.

The men merely shifted uncomfortably in their positions and the sergeant sighed. He knew that he was being harsh but things had to be done according to the SOP. If no one did it then what were they there for?

I forgot to bring my soul, muttered the corporal. I forgot to bring it.

A few sniggers were heard from the men and the sergeant was ready to give a light kick to this wise-cracker when he looked into the corporal's eyes and realised, it was the truth. He searched himself and discovered that hadn't brought his own either. But it had been by no slipping of the mind.

That's okay, you don't need it anyway, he told the glaze-eyed young man. It ain't a mission essential. Like a lonely man in a cinema who has just watched a rather bad movie, the wind broke its silence and gave a sigh, thereafter retreating into quiet contemplation. The sergeant gave orders to reorganise and they continued with their training for the rest of the afternoon. It was a practice of motions. A rehearsal of murder. A simulation of destruction.

A firing of blanks.

edited again 16/8/08

Going Camping

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat."
-Theodore Roosevelt

Went to watch the juniors race at the nationals on friday. There were many faces on the race grounds that day. Faces of Aspiration. Excitement. Determination.

And I realised, with some poignancy, how long it been since I had seen these faces.

busy or lazy

will write something substantial soon. =/

shortlived

Spent most of the day working on an arrangement of sesame street for the ukulele.

Some helicopter thing, 10km run, field camp and live firings next week. Sounds quite tiring but I guess we'll pull through it like every other week.

My Foray into Noir Fiction. Part Five.

Previously.

Two weeks later and there he was again, standing in front of my desk with a gun to his head. How he'd gotten the gun, I had no idea. You could never really tell what Timmy was going to come up with next. You could only hope that by then you were far far away.

"I'm at my wits end, only you can help me now."

"I don't remember you having any wits in the first place, Tim."

"Shut up. I'm serious this time."

"As serious as the time you said you were going to join the Avengers?"

"If you can't help me, I'm pulling it. There's no other way out for me."

His index finger was wrapped tightly around the trigger, the barrel pointing to the side of his head. I noticed how drenched in sweat he was, especially around the armpits. The sweat stains seemed to form a strange, symmetrical face-like pattern on his light yellow shirt and it suddenly occurred to me that I had never seen Timmy sweat before.

"Well I know you're not going to. You don't have the GU-"

BAM.

And Timmy was dead, just like that.

If this was a novel, the chapter would have ended right there and then near the top of the page, leaving a blank space at the bottom for the reader to contemplate over this shocking turn of events. But for some reason, I didn't feel a thing. The sight of Timmy's head jerking to the side from the impact of the bullet, the spray of blood, his body falling onto the floor, without the slow-mo effects, it all just seemed 'usual', like watching a ball roll off a table.

I waited for a few minutes, then stood up from my chair and walked over to the body. Even in death, Timmy was still a neat-nik. His body was spread out on the floor in the exact position of any chalk outline you might've seen at a crime scene. A TV crime scene, to be exact.

A small puddle of blood was taking it's time growing beneath his head. The gun was stilled gripped, though much more relaxed now, in his left hand. The bullet wound was a neat little hole through his head and blood was already starting to clot, making it looked more like an over-sized blister. You could've put the scene in a kid's movie and no one would have given a damn.

I looked at the clock on the wall of my office. It was just past midnight. I sighed for no real reason at all. Maybe I felt that the room had gone too quiet. I gave some thought to what had just happened. My best friend, or rather, my only friend, had just killed himself. I had a dead body in front of my feet. Someone was going to have to clean up the blood stains. And the bullet, going clean through his head, had broken my window.

This was probably going to be my worst birthday ever.

wtfpwned

My faith in the goodness of Man has been greatly shaken. Got totally ripped off at our dear old Sim Lim Square whilst trying to fix my computer. It's only been 2 years and I can't tell between the pci's, agp's and vga's anymore, not to mention I totally let that Indian chap pull a fast one on me by not bothering to counter check prices with the other dealers. I even nicely let him keep the change.

Going back tomorrow for a rematch.

A-OK

Only 2 more weeks to passing out. Ah, life is good. Hoping for a miracle in posting but ASLC seems almost certain for me.

Weekends

Really feeling the burn this week, with almost the whole Saturday sucked up by live firing. Slept in today and a few hours later, here I am.

Been playing the ukulele recently and I now find myself torn between it and the guitar. Initially, I thought it would be a fill-in for lack of guitar and it's portability meant that I could easily stash it in the cupboard or under my bed in camp. After a few hiccups in finding a playable one, I finally found a half decent piece suitable for honing my chops. Having two strings less than a guitar, you'd think it as a lesser counterpart to the guitar but alas, the beauty lies in the simplicity of four-strings and it's bright sandy beach sound. Think I'll be leaving my trusty old Yamaha acoustic on the stand for awhile.

I want to go to Hawaii one day.

Here I Am

We were falling in on the road after lunch the other day. As usual, we were slightly late which led to some members of the platoon being stressed and one such fellow imposed a question onto Shaun, who had carelessly left a gaping hole in the file which ruined the formation.

Guy: Where are you!?

Shaun: I am here.

I guess a straightforward question deserves a straightforward answer. Nevertheless, much laughter and amusement followed and it was probably moment of the week for me.

Sometimes, all it takes is for us to say "Here I am." What more is needed to justify our existence? Not all the time do we need to think we are undeserving or inadequate to receive the love of God. On the contrary, we lose sight of Him in our struggle to climb a mountain that can never be overcome in a lifetime. He calls out, but we reject Him, saying wait, let me get there and then we can speak and forgetting that he is not waiting for us at the top of the peak, but climbing it with us. How can He help us get to where we want to go if we won't even tell Him where we are?

Interesting how the whole idea of Here I Am has been hounding me over the past week in army life, daily devotions and bible study.

On to other parts of life, Queen musical was a decent watch. Great music but plagued by a lousy ending and lack of any climatic scenes. Got the cheapest tickets which weren't that bad. Noticed some families which left the show halfway. Must've been too much of a shock for the children when they were suddenly exposed to the pr0n and nudity (statues). After the show we discussed Freddie's overflowing gayness in the song Don't Stop Me Now, such as having a ball and being a rocket ship to Mars, where men are from. Radio Ga Ga and the B.Rhapsody solo got stuck in my head for the whole week amidst the jungle bashing and 2.4km IPPT run.

Can't help but feel that as my NS life goes by, certain groups of friends just seem to be inevitably disappearing. The image of Chee Heng trying to do the swing trainer comes to mind, as he reaches out to the next bar, but alas his arms are too short and despite having a look of constipation on his face, he still loses grip on the previous bar, falling into the sand pit in quiet disappointment.

So, Can I Have Some?

Prologue.
I'll always remember that fateful night, when the four of us were sitting round a table in the wee hours of the morning pondering upon what life had in store for us and wondering what to get from the counter next. Although we had the whole night, we had already tried the whole buffet and options were running out.

The Story.
It seemed that the night had come to an inevitable end. Food at the tables were becoming scarce and even the barbecued skewered meat on bamboo sticks with a fragrant peanut dipping sauce on the side of which we had helped ourselves to generously was starting to get old. We needed something new, something fresh.

As if to answer out prayers, a smell of sweet, sweet vanilla and eggs wafted through the air like a siren's song and we found ourselves craning our necks in desperate search of the source. The sight of flapjacks being flipped skillfully by the master chef was enough to drive us mad with desire. Utterly entranced by the scent, one amongst us set forth bravely, plate in hand to procure the fluffy delights.

The chef, surprised by his approach, gave the initial refusal to share the bounty, claiming that it was meant for the breakfast menu. No doubt he already had other plans in mind for his hotcakes, probably one that involved a staff-only room and new age music. However, our young adventurer was undeterred and saw through his trickery, for it was but three in the morning and breakfast did not begin till seven. Without skipping a beat, he replied, "So, can I have some?"

It seems that the pluckiness of youth was too much for this stubborn man to bear and he reluctantly parted with the tasty morsels. The young boy, now made a man, returned in triumph with a steaming plate of pancakes and was warmly welcomed by our jubilant cheers of victory. Till this day, I can still remember my first bite into those wheels of joy, fluffy and syrupy and all.

It was like manna from heaven.

Epilogue.
The table beside us made an attempt to get their share of pancakes too, no doubt jealous of our success and celebration. However, they were too late, for the chef was not to be determined not to be foiled twice. What's more, they lacked the vigour and spirit of our merry bunch and as expected, returned empty-plated.

As for us, we did try for a second helping but it was too late, for the siren had disappeared into the depths along with the bag of pancake mix. Pancakes just never seemed the same after that. Yes, we still enjoyed some "decent" ones here and there in the months after but incomparable they were, to those we had that night.

The incident, which we decided to call "So, Can I Have Some" also became a frequent topic in our conversations but for reasons unknown, none of us ever suggested returning to the place. Maybe we thought that once was enough, or maybe we were afraid, yes afraid, of disappointment. What is certain however, is that none of us will ever forget that night.

With Pride We Need, Sixpacks

Resistance is Fertile

Amidst,
Endless torrents of angry shouting
Stern faces and a grave warning.

Amidst,
Order, order says the dude beside
As timmy in front goes on backslide.

Amidst,
Their faces straight, though their minds are not
A resentful past, not to be forgot.

There are chuckles and laughter, hearty and loud,
from the back, and futility dies.

Credits to Shaun for the title, which as he described it, came to him "as if God reached out from the Heavens with a hand and put in in his head." Specialist training has been rather tough so far, with the many canteen breaks, afternoon naps and jogging on the spot that we have to go through. At least that's for the first week. Not expecting a status quo though.

Personal Qualities

"an ardous task that involved removing bird droppings from the upper roof of the facility."

Just noticed this on my Personal Qualities sheet. Should be worth at least a +5 to community service.

Merciful

Much ought to be said about the mercy and grace of God but I think my A level grades sum it up quite nicely.

After 3 weeks of false alarms, I finally found myself in the school hall waiting for my slip. Experienced a variety of emotions when Ms K finally handed it to me after some rambling about my absence (late) from the hall earlier. In order of appearance:

1. Disbelief- That I had nothing below a B.

2. Joy- Hooray.

3. Gratefulness- To God for being so merciful and saving me time and again (O levels, Promos, A levels) despite me always being ungrateful and complacent, not learning from my mistakes. Felt like I was being given a 9871245245240891-th chance at life.

4. Guilt- Upon realisation that it was by God's grace alone that I, the undeserving fool made it through.

5. Helplessness- For I didn't really dare to confront those who didn't do that well. I guess I'm not that good at words when it comes to comforting people and I felt really helpless just standing there watching some of my friends crying. There was also an awkward situation involving an inquiry into someone's results which I literally ran away from because of an unexpected reaction.

6. Confusion- Beh!? I had seriously made preparations for the worst but the unexpected circumstances I now found myself in was overwhelming.

7. Disappointment- An issue of my pride, which I should not be bothered with having already been blessed with such a miracle. But still, I thought about what I could have achieved if I had bothered to study harder.

And so the A levels are really all over now and for the better or for the worst, there is nothing I can do about anything.

Watch Fixing..

was an epic failure. Getting a new watch.

Don't know why I'm making such a fuss about this. Maybe I'm just ticked off by the fact that it stopped working within the first week of training and that my attempts to merely change the battery (first step to fixing it) has resulted in a most definitely voided warranty, not due to my incompetence but because of its poor design and cheap price.

Pensive

Was actually going to write something substantial but time pulled a fast one on me. Need to pack my stuff and attempt to fix my watch (lifespan: one week) before I go back in later.

Like I always say, God help us all.

NS

time is flexible

Maybe I'll write some poetry in NS.

KKS

Chanced upon my secondary 1 and 2 form teacher, Mr. Khoo Khay Soon today. It was kind of a surreal experience because he looked the same and was wearing the same attire AND expression on his face that our class will always remember him for.

On a related note, I also chanced upon this, a blog set up by some cat high boy(s) in an effort to rally against the hair-snipping school authority. Must commend him/them for his/their vision of liberating the masses from sloped hair but sadly, no one is going to give a shit about it after awhile. Soon, they'll realise that things like that just ain't worth fighting for. (If you consider blog ranting as fighting) Even if they get to keep their hair long, they still have to wear the green shorts. And that's a -500 to street cred. A year later, they'll be in pre-u education, where people don't care about hair that much. Few more years and no hair at all. Poof! Story of my life.

Some choice quotes from Mr. anti-establishment (Fyi, GKY is the discipline dude):

-"I'm going to rebel against GKY

Signing off,
Justice Fringe-less"

And a few days later:

-"On the other hand i passed the RE hair check ! AHAHAHAHAHA"

So much for rebellion I guess.

let it be

i want to but my right eye is screwed up.

Let it be, let it be, let it be, let it be.
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be.

argh frikkin eye.