Watched Batman Begins the other day with the Dreikaiserbund.

The whole concept of the Bat-man is quite fascinating, the darkness, the fear, the deep brooding guilt and regret that lies at the heart of the whole story.

I dont know. I need a role model who's survived a tragic loss and has gained strength from his fear and hatred and grief, to become a wielder of terror and darkness to compensate for a failed past.

Where does God figure in all this?

I know not. Then again, I dont suppose that God figured much in The Cataclysm either.

posted by baron at 8:04 AM

School of Armour
Specialist Training Wing
Bionix Armoured Infantry Section Leader Course

Somehow, life on the mainland doesnt seem so much like its on the mainland in Lim Chu Kang.

To the south, cemetries define the landscape. To the north, chicken farms as far as the eye can see.

And all the atmosphere is filled with that noxious vapour that is chicken flatulence.

But on the bright side, the instructors there are good, as is the cookhouse food.

I guess that about sums up the environment I am in.

Ahh but the circumstances, the situation, that is so much more complex, so much more dynamic, than the smell of the surrounding air or the geography of the camp or the taste of cookhouse food.

I am numb.

Nothing new there, you say. Youve always been that numb, immobile, dead persona ever since this blog was set up eons ago. What's so much more number about you now than that numbness that gripped you years before?

You see, the whole thing about Mechanized Armour training is that its the toughest course I've ever had. So much more physically demanding than SISPEC. Sure, SISPEC was numbing because it was just plain mentally deadening, but Armour cauterizes your awareness, your consciousness, by making you go through circuit training after circuit training.

Dont get me wrong, its an exciting place to be in. The vehicle Im on is a Bionix 40/50. As the name implies, its got a 40 mm Automatic Grenade Launcher , a 50 calibre heavy machine gun and a General Purpose Machine Gun on it. That is seriously awesome firepower vis a vis the infantry section that it is intended to fight and annihilate. The 40mm AGL is a piece of art in itself. Imagine your M203 firing. Just one shot per 5 seconds. This baby can fire up to FIVE HUNDRED 40mm bombs in a MINUTE. Pure, beautiful, devastation.

But oh, the price you pay for wielding such power. My arms are still aching even now from all that handling and physical training. It does not come cheap at all.

That about sums up the initial week of my Armour stint.

posted by baron at 6:52 AM

Was reading George Orwell's Coming Up for Air.

Panoramic and funny stuff, and very penetrating too, in typical Brit fashion.

Somehow I feel I can idnetify with it- that unbearable tension of coming war, of massive overwhelming nostalgia and sentiment for the old times, completely at odds with the Bruce Springsteen song I'm listening to now.

Ah yes Springsteen- whoes songs are the embodiment of that upbeat, on-the-bounce, optimistic, victorious frontier spirit of the US of A. The US of A indeed! A land in the ascendent, of high hopes and high dreams, and totally high-spirited, as depicted in Springsteen's The Rising. Even I the cynic am drawn to that spirit of hope and renewal.

But about Orwell's Coming Up for Air. Thats what I can identify with more. About the times when I was in good company and in a good school surrounded by good stuff. And what good company!

Oh I'm not going to start about that company again. I've grown numb to it. I meant the sort of people- my classmates, my church clique- that I did stuff with and had a good laugh about it all.
Man do I miss those times.

And now all that has faded. The rest of the world has moved on into scholarships and relationships and universities and bright sparkling futures. Whilst I look into 5 months of Armour Infantry training. About rushing out from the Bionix IFV in full battle order and all that.

I cant whine and gripe, it solves nothing. I just can't help reflecting on how things are, and how I long for the things of the past.

posted by baron at 9:41 AM

Clocks, by Coldplay

Lights go out and I can’t be saved
Tides that I tried to swim against
Brought me down upon my knees
Oh I beg, I beg and plead

Singin’, come out if things aren’t said
Shoot an apple off my head
And a, trouble that can’t be named
Tigers waitin’ to be tamed

Singing, yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh

Yoooooooooooo ohhhhhh

Confusion never stops
Closing walls and ticking clocks
Gonna, come back and take you home
I could not stop that you now know

Singin’, come out upon my seas
Curse missed opportunities
Am I, a part of the cure
Or am I part of the disease

Singin’, yoooooooooooo ohhhhhh
Yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh
Yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh
Yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh
Yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh
Yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh

Oh nothing else compares
Oh nothing else compares
And nothing else compares
Yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh
Yooooooooooooo ohhhhhh

Home, home, where I wanted to go
Home, home, where I wanted to go
Home, home, where I wanted to go
Home, home, where I wanted to go

posted by baron at 9:11 AM

Withdrawn (I) 66.67%, Outgoing (E) 33.33%

Imaginative (N) 65.85%, Realistic (S) 34.15%

Emotional (F) 57.45%, Intellectual (T) 42.55%

Organized (J) 56.52%, Improvised (P) 43.48%

Your type is: INFJ


You are a Guide, possible professions include - career counselor, psychologist, educational consultant, special education teacher, librarian, artist, playwright, novelist/poet, editor/art director, information-graphics, designer, HRM manager, merchandise planner, environmental lawyer, marketer, job analyst, mental health counselor, dietitian/nutritionist, research, educational consultant, architects, interpreter/translator.

So says http://similarminds.com/career.html

Am I really?

How interesting. Withdrawn, imaginative, emotional, and organised.

Intriguing.

posted by baron at 7:59 AM

Days of Darkness 3: Tales from the School of Infantry Specialists
Endgame

The bulk of Term Two seemed alot more easy than Term One.

I don't know how to put it; it just seemed that the programme was smoother and more coherent, notwithstanding the fact that I was made the Platoon In-Charge and then the Company In-Charge the week after.

Being an IC is quite an experience, to say the least. Suddenly everything changes. Your whole perspective is strained, you're more aware of the need to be on the ball, to be updated with as much information as possible about the next programme and so on, and above all theres that incredible pressure on you to account for each and every trainee, be he on medical status or on off-pass or whatever. And you're the punching bag for the instructors, as exemplified during the Matador live firing.

We'd just finished with the last of the rocket launching when dinner came at 1745 hours. So there was I, making sure everyone had their food, and about to tuck into my own, when good old Frankenstein tells me to fall in the company at 6pm sharp. 15 bloody minutes to consume dinner!!

Frankenstein's real title is 2WO Goh (my Platoon Commander), but his nickname fits him better, as all nicknames tend to do. He's a skinny but realll tall walking corpse complete with facial features in permanent rigour mortis. He keeps a meat cleaver under his desk, which everyone says is the tool with which he murdered his family 35 years ago. And I'd never disliked him more than that point of time at the Matador Range.

Everybody had trouble accepting the instructions. Twas by only the grace of God that we all managed to declare ourselves free from ammo 10 minutes behind schedule.

Ahh but the live firing was fantastic. Live firing is always fantastic; a pity they dont have live targets for live rounds. Some people do deserve to be shot. But anyway the only drawback to fire the Matador is that the range is all the way in Pasir Labar Camp.

I didnt fire the real thing, but the sub-calibre rocket was good enough.
BUUNNG-WHOOOOOSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSH-BBAAANG!! I think I missed my target but heck the adrenaline rush was immense. The real rocket was cool too, it was exciting watching it streaking at a crazy speed to the target. Then there's the flash of yellow, a cloud of black smoke, and the thunder-bang that sounds like the bursting of a great big kettle-drum's skin.

Same for the M203 firing. The recoil was heavier than I expected, but it was like having a mini mortar in your hands. The round goes Thoouuunk! when the trigger was pulled and the weapon jumps back into your body with a whiff of cordite. And up the round goes, landing with a small puff of grey smoke. A second later the bang sound is heard.

Live firing was cool for the SAW and SAR as well. The SAR has a screwed-up scope, and that meant I kept missing my targets and getting screwed by the instructors. But firing the tracer rounds with the Laser Aiming Device was wicked enough.

And as for the SAW- whoa nelly! The thing goes CHAT-CHAT-CHAT-CHAT-CHAT-CHAT whenever you touch the trigger and you feel like youre having an orgasm. It feels just like in the war-films where you see the machine-gunners having a go at the enemy with all the golden cartridges flying everywhere. CHATCHATCHATCHATCHATCHAT!! Wicked, I tell you. Simply wicked.

The rest of Term 2 involved some ropes courses like rappelling and more obstacle stuff, just like in Outward Bound. But the climax was the 3 day trench digging exercise where we dug till our deaths.

It was incredible. Non-stop plugging away at the ground, which was thankfully softened by previous rains.But I had armpit abrasions after the first night, which turned every motion into pure torture for me. But thank God I survived the whole mad thing. I made a vow to forget all about it, and I'm glad I'm mostly successful. Enough about trench digging. Enough. Enough.

Another interesting experience was the visit to the Tear Gas Chamber as part of the thing on chemical defence. Had to wear the bleeding cumbersome chemical uniform for almost an hour, and in the end you take it off and let the tear gas corrode you face away. But it was cool in a wierd way, cos the mask makes you look like Darth Vader or those troopers of the Combine Overwatch in Half Life 2. And the Warrant giving us the course was a real funny chap, he kept insisting that we called the gas chamber the "CS Smoke Trainer" and not "gas chamber" because the latter made people think of the Nazi extermination camps. HAHAHA. Which, of course, only made us refer to the smoke room as the "gas chamber" even more.

Missed the section live firing and the 32km route march thanks to pain in my flat feet. But well the anti climatic feeling was rolled over by my posting:

SCHOOL OF ARMOUR, Armour Infantry Section Leader Course. NUTS!!

5 months to my next rank!

That was the end of my days in SISPEC.

posted by baron at 8:34 PM