OBS
Friday, February 5, 2010 9:39 PM
Fruitful was the journey of xtine's OBS! And here I will pen my experience down so that I shall never forget the fun and fruits of OBS, which I miss so dearly right now.
Perhaps i'm the only one who enjoyed the experience to the maximum. I loved the activities. I loved my watch. I loved Marie for the time she was healthy enough to spend with us. I loved Llewell's lame stories and jokes (and lame name. C'mon, it's not LOwell, it's LE WELL). But most importantly, I loved the tuna.
I didn't like pitching tents alot, but then that saw improvement - by the 2nd night we could pitch each tent within 10 minutes. Trekking was devishly difficult, and mess tins, pots, and cutlery can be MUCH heavier than you'd think they are. I got to be navigator for our land expedition, and I can really safely say that although having a huge responsibility is very scary, it is extremely satisfying to pursue and accomplish your role\mission\goal.
Okay, maybe it'd be more organised if I go by day.
DAY ONE
We met Marie! She's short and nice. First we did introductions then we played Trust Fall - Group members hold up a sheet of PVC (or something) and one person is supposed to fall onto it. Sadly, I had to go first. Well, actually Amanda was supposed to go first since she was (maybe) the lightest, but since she was too chicken to do it, I had to go first. Yay.
I loved watch games. We had to do a sequence of stations: group skip-roping, group ski (walking on planks with strings attached) then pebble toss. And (inevitably) our watch won. Huzzah! ZING Z-ZING Z-ZING ZANG Z-ZANG Z-ZANG TENZING TENZING ALL THE WAY TENZING TENZING YAY YAY YAY GO TENZING!
We were a big, happy bunch after winning watch games. We tried two more times and improved from 12 minutes to 2 and a half minutes. We were pumped. We sat around the scoreboard and as the other instructors wrote down slower timings, we cheered. It was mean of us, I agree, but how could we help it? We're too awesome. =D
We had a fire drill, and we cooked outdoors for the first time. It was quite exciting and all of us really got drunk on the smell and look of the rice. Unfortunately the rice at the bottom was rock hard. Other than rice, we heated up tuna (which was probably the best canned food we got), curry chicken, and PEANUTS! I kept fantasizing about pizza though. =( We were sort of briefed on the expedition, and I felt too lazy to even think about it, much less do it. Then we heard Marie got sick. =( Chee Tong stepped in, and it's not like he's mean or evil or smelly, but Tenzing feels weird having to share instructors.
We pitched our tents in front of the seaside beside the jetty. I couldn't sleep at all, and my feet were cold in the morning.
DAY TWO
My old shoes were giving me blisters, so I stole Melissa "baby" (the first-aid kit) to tape my foot up. The tape kept coming off though. It was very annoying. (Hwee Ming's "so annoying"! DING DING DING)
So we abseiled today! Exciting! I loved abseiling. I really enjoyed abseiling during the P5 camp. I imagined this would be effortless. Alas! It was not to be. D= We met Llewell today. We had to re-introduce ourselves, this time with a soft toy crab. It even came with a detachable shell. HOW COOL IS THAT?! It was Llewell's. He has this penchant for childish behaviour. He looked really weird with the harness on. And Cheetong was even worse. Aha ha ha. It was very uncomfortable to walk in the harness, and I mean VERY. But we got used to it after practice, which was when Llewell made up that stupid Bush joke. ARGHHH
Shuhui went first and she took really darn long. And soon before long it was my turn! Hurrah! Anyhow, at first it was really easy, as long as you did the Michael Jackson. (Moonwalk? Walking backwards? Get it? No? Ugh.) But then the rock face started unnevening out (if that's a word) and I slipped two times into the darn bushes! But then I made it to the bottom pretty easy, slow and steady. Which was when I realised I dropped Panda. (Another one of Llewell's soft toys) I kept moaning about it because I'd hate to lose one of my own soft toys. D= After, I scared Amanda and Rui Jun. It was fun. =D
12 people abseiled and no one could get the darn panda. Natalie was the one who saw it (huzzah) but none of 'em could get it. I felt even worse. Then came Natalia, who must've taken 12412345 hours to get past the cliff edge. Then it was Jingyi's turn! AND SHE GOT PANDA. We asked Llewell before if she'd gotten it, and he'd just say "Dunno". Oh, how were we to know this would be a regular thing later on? =(
Also, we didn't get to do flying fox. Disappointment set in.
Then we trekked to the seaside campsite. I forgot what it was called, maybe something Jong... Our first trek was absolutely horrible. Who knew mess tins could be so darn heavy? Well, not me. Worse, the terrain was so uneven. BUT we made it, and that's what matters. Right? RIGHT? Right. So during sharing we... uh... shared. I mostly talked about mangroves, flying fish and peanuts. Then I said some nonsense about during the process it's very painful to carry on, but completing a task rewards you with an even greater gift, and you'll realise it wasn't all that difficult in the first place. Plus, the sooner you finish, the less time you have to worry about your aching shoulders and sore legs!
DAY THREE (Bear with my superlongexpicalifragilisticespielidocious post)
We trekked. Again. Yes. This time, it was even worse. Tenzing and Shackleton teamed up to form SHACKLEZING! YAY
We had to go from the seaside to Camp 2 to Camp 1, and boy, oh boy, was it hell. I was carrying to happy food. And it did not make me happy at all. It was bad, but we tried distracting ourselves (Joyce, Curtains, Pei Jun, Sheng Yu and I) with songs. We did Flea Fly Mosquito + Motorcar, "There was a stream", and I can't remember what else. Guide campfire songs. It worked. For a while.
Guess what we did after that? KAYAKING. Tri-yaking was probably the highlight of my OBS. The only way to describe kayaking: undescribable. It was THAT amazing. Capsize practice was difficult - my arms were way too short to grab the other side of the TriYak, and the paddle would NEVER keep itself down. So much for Harry Potter. (Broom riding, get it?) It got tiring, and salt water kept getting into my eyes (packs a real punch), but we pushed on. Our motivation? One - Death by way of drowning under a boat. Two - Oreos. Three - Butter buns. =D
DINNER. Fresh dinner. Honeydew syrup. Best I've ever had. Chicken. Too much. Fried rice. Good. Poor badminton people had to be left out of that good dinner because of their tournament. Pei Jun and I finished the drink. Somehow, it has 2 times the stomach capacity compared to normal liquids. Since we were so full we wanted to puke, and my face was red from sunburn, we called ourselves drunk, and I really felt that way. It was fun. I was asked if I was local. Sunburn makes me look Caucasian. How's that? I'm an aaaang mowww!
During sharing at Orchard Road that night, Natalie was full of complaints. Veeeery entertaining ah, veh entertaining. We had the best showers today - hooks on the doors, showers that didn't rip the skin right off your shoulders. Yeah.
We had to walk in the dark back to our really dirty and scary jungle campsite. It was sufficiently creepy.
DAY FOUR
Shengyu gave me the glow stick she got from Llewell who was swinging it around during our walk in the dark previously! I like glow sticks.
Land expedition! I got to be navigator for the first station plus some. I found it very, very challenging, but then the most challenging tasks are the most exciting. It's only when you step out of your comfort zone that you start learning (ha). My bag was really light, because Sifei left due to sickness and took her clothes with her. Finally a light bag!
Llewell must've forgotten we needed lunch because we only ate at around 3pm after our 3rd checkpoint. It's okay, we threw red bean buns at him. Seriously, no one likes red bean buns. Not even Llewell. Or God. Does he? I dunno. Maybe we should start using iGod again.
Did I mention Tenzing's addiction to mosquito coils (notably Natalie)?
The last station got changed because we must've taken forever to finish lunch (where I stole Natalie's precious butter biscuits, by the way!) We trekked all the way back to Camp 2. By then I'd gotten sick of the stupid stream song. For heaven's sake! Sing something besides peace like a river and streams and fountains and all! (Oh, that was because Llewell invented this stupid rule that since we passed one of the gates, we'd have to sing songs every 5 minutes or we'd return to the gate - it failed later on anyway. Like the LON.) And then guess what? Revelation! Llewell invented CHANTING. The cause of Jingyi and Shuhui's mental illnesses. How nice.
Finally, Camp 2 was in our sight. We were relieved. Very relieved. We then had a cook-off with Shackleton, and it was pretty cool to see Jingyi but such think slices of carrot. =D And then Amanda scolded me for thinking that the whole cabbage bunch is just thrown into the soup like that. Aha ha. Then came apple crumble from the instructors! Happy happy tasty tasty! Also, sorry to Pei Jun for spilling some on her.
We then were assigned to wash up everything from dinner, and ended up half an hour late, missing our final activity. Then we got a long lecture from Llewell (FRIGGIN NAME IS SO IRRITATING TO TYPE ARGHH) about being late and reasons for said problem. And we ended up carrying VERY guilty hearts to set up our tents and shower. During sharing Hwee Min or someone mentioned dissappointing the instructors, and they said not to worry about it. That's beauty right there. No need to worry about the little things. Just worry about yourself. Worry about you, what you miss, what you gain, not about impressing or disappointing others - at least not all the time. That's the essence of simple living.
We camped out at the flat campsite behind the instructors' block, packed\unpacked belongings, all that.
DAY FIVE
Today! I was really, really sad. I didn't want to leave at all. We probably had the best end to our OBS course ever. Around 6.40 in the morning, just as the sun was rising and the moon still hung up high, we participatd in the signature JETTY JUMP! Free-falling is very appealing to me right now.
I went fourth or fifth this time. After you jump, the first thing you think is WHY AM I NOT TOUCHING THE WATER YET WHY AM I NOT TOUCHING THE WATER YET WHY AM I NOT TOUCHING THE WATER YET, then in a splash you land and a thousand litres of really salty soup enters your system. I don't know why, but the water was really, very, very much saltier than water nearer to the shore. But it was good, the sunrise was very pretty, and I saw a vertical cloud column, which I really liked.
Later on, we walked into a jungle path from the corner of the rock-climbing wall. So we had to go down a "well", crawl through a "sewer", then come up the other side. It was dry and it didn't smell too smelly. The smartypants who planned this challenge was really innovative. The tunnel was pitch black with three or four turns, and our OBS certificates hidden in the middle. After we emerged, all Natalie had was Hwee Min's crumpled certificate, without a pen or letter... Nice one, Natalie.
After that was pack! Wash! Scrub! Hang! Hook! Carry! Preperations to go home. Highlight of the day? Helping Shackleton hammer pegs while singing Disney songs in that manly operatic voice and fake vibrato. Well, I met Amber, who seems to be amused by such things. =D After that...Pay! Beg Llewell to finish his Nasi Lemak story! He told a weird guppy story instead! With no ending whatsoever! Still, funny while it lasted.
And so we took the boat and sang a really long rendition of the stream song (again), talked in British accents, told Hermione to stop eating my shit, had our bags checked by police, bought our souvenirs, and without a goodbye to any of our instructors and without seeing Marie again, we were quickly whisked away. Then we knew that we'd left the OBS atmosphere and returned to our hectic, messy, busy Singaporean lives. Wonderful. Just wonderful.
P.S. I'd like to thank everyone in Tenzing, plus our instructors and OBS. You made my day. Or week. Whatever.
Friday, February 5, 2010 9:39 PM
Fruitful was the journey of xtine's OBS! And here I will pen my experience down so that I shall never forget the fun and fruits of OBS, which I miss so dearly right now.
Perhaps i'm the only one who enjoyed the experience to the maximum. I loved the activities. I loved my watch. I loved Marie for the time she was healthy enough to spend with us. I loved Llewell's lame stories and jokes (and lame name. C'mon, it's not LOwell, it's LE WELL). But most importantly, I loved the tuna.
I didn't like pitching tents alot, but then that saw improvement - by the 2nd night we could pitch each tent within 10 minutes. Trekking was devishly difficult, and mess tins, pots, and cutlery can be MUCH heavier than you'd think they are. I got to be navigator for our land expedition, and I can really safely say that although having a huge responsibility is very scary, it is extremely satisfying to pursue and accomplish your role\mission\goal.
Okay, maybe it'd be more organised if I go by day.
DAY ONE
We met Marie! She's short and nice. First we did introductions then we played Trust Fall - Group members hold up a sheet of PVC (or something) and one person is supposed to fall onto it. Sadly, I had to go first. Well, actually Amanda was supposed to go first since she was (maybe) the lightest, but since she was too chicken to do it, I had to go first. Yay.
I loved watch games. We had to do a sequence of stations: group skip-roping, group ski (walking on planks with strings attached) then pebble toss. And (inevitably) our watch won. Huzzah! ZING Z-ZING Z-ZING ZANG Z-ZANG Z-ZANG TENZING TENZING ALL THE WAY TENZING TENZING YAY YAY YAY GO TENZING!
We were a big, happy bunch after winning watch games. We tried two more times and improved from 12 minutes to 2 and a half minutes. We were pumped. We sat around the scoreboard and as the other instructors wrote down slower timings, we cheered. It was mean of us, I agree, but how could we help it? We're too awesome. =D
We had a fire drill, and we cooked outdoors for the first time. It was quite exciting and all of us really got drunk on the smell and look of the rice. Unfortunately the rice at the bottom was rock hard. Other than rice, we heated up tuna (which was probably the best canned food we got), curry chicken, and PEANUTS! I kept fantasizing about pizza though. =( We were sort of briefed on the expedition, and I felt too lazy to even think about it, much less do it. Then we heard Marie got sick. =( Chee Tong stepped in, and it's not like he's mean or evil or smelly, but Tenzing feels weird having to share instructors.
We pitched our tents in front of the seaside beside the jetty. I couldn't sleep at all, and my feet were cold in the morning.
DAY TWO
My old shoes were giving me blisters, so I stole Melissa "baby" (the first-aid kit) to tape my foot up. The tape kept coming off though. It was very annoying. (Hwee Ming's "so annoying"! DING DING DING)
So we abseiled today! Exciting! I loved abseiling. I really enjoyed abseiling during the P5 camp. I imagined this would be effortless. Alas! It was not to be. D= We met Llewell today. We had to re-introduce ourselves, this time with a soft toy crab. It even came with a detachable shell. HOW COOL IS THAT?! It was Llewell's. He has this penchant for childish behaviour. He looked really weird with the harness on. And Cheetong was even worse. Aha ha ha. It was very uncomfortable to walk in the harness, and I mean VERY. But we got used to it after practice, which was when Llewell made up that stupid Bush joke. ARGHHH
Shuhui went first and she took really darn long. And soon before long it was my turn! Hurrah! Anyhow, at first it was really easy, as long as you did the Michael Jackson. (Moonwalk? Walking backwards? Get it? No? Ugh.) But then the rock face started unnevening out (if that's a word) and I slipped two times into the darn bushes! But then I made it to the bottom pretty easy, slow and steady. Which was when I realised I dropped Panda. (Another one of Llewell's soft toys) I kept moaning about it because I'd hate to lose one of my own soft toys. D= After, I scared Amanda and Rui Jun. It was fun. =D
12 people abseiled and no one could get the darn panda. Natalie was the one who saw it (huzzah) but none of 'em could get it. I felt even worse. Then came Natalia, who must've taken 12412345 hours to get past the cliff edge. Then it was Jingyi's turn! AND SHE GOT PANDA. We asked Llewell before if she'd gotten it, and he'd just say "Dunno". Oh, how were we to know this would be a regular thing later on? =(
Also, we didn't get to do flying fox. Disappointment set in.
Then we trekked to the seaside campsite. I forgot what it was called, maybe something Jong... Our first trek was absolutely horrible. Who knew mess tins could be so darn heavy? Well, not me. Worse, the terrain was so uneven. BUT we made it, and that's what matters. Right? RIGHT? Right. So during sharing we... uh... shared. I mostly talked about mangroves, flying fish and peanuts. Then I said some nonsense about during the process it's very painful to carry on, but completing a task rewards you with an even greater gift, and you'll realise it wasn't all that difficult in the first place. Plus, the sooner you finish, the less time you have to worry about your aching shoulders and sore legs!
DAY THREE (Bear with my superlongexpicalifragilisticespielidocious post)
We trekked. Again. Yes. This time, it was even worse. Tenzing and Shackleton teamed up to form SHACKLEZING! YAY
We had to go from the seaside to Camp 2 to Camp 1, and boy, oh boy, was it hell. I was carrying to happy food. And it did not make me happy at all. It was bad, but we tried distracting ourselves (Joyce, Curtains, Pei Jun, Sheng Yu and I) with songs. We did Flea Fly Mosquito + Motorcar, "There was a stream", and I can't remember what else. Guide campfire songs. It worked. For a while.
Guess what we did after that? KAYAKING. Tri-yaking was probably the highlight of my OBS. The only way to describe kayaking: undescribable. It was THAT amazing. Capsize practice was difficult - my arms were way too short to grab the other side of the TriYak, and the paddle would NEVER keep itself down. So much for Harry Potter. (Broom riding, get it?) It got tiring, and salt water kept getting into my eyes (packs a real punch), but we pushed on. Our motivation? One - Death by way of drowning under a boat. Two - Oreos. Three - Butter buns. =D
DINNER. Fresh dinner. Honeydew syrup. Best I've ever had. Chicken. Too much. Fried rice. Good. Poor badminton people had to be left out of that good dinner because of their tournament. Pei Jun and I finished the drink. Somehow, it has 2 times the stomach capacity compared to normal liquids. Since we were so full we wanted to puke, and my face was red from sunburn, we called ourselves drunk, and I really felt that way. It was fun. I was asked if I was local. Sunburn makes me look Caucasian. How's that? I'm an aaaang mowww!
During sharing at Orchard Road that night, Natalie was full of complaints. Veeeery entertaining ah, veh entertaining. We had the best showers today - hooks on the doors, showers that didn't rip the skin right off your shoulders. Yeah.
We had to walk in the dark back to our really dirty and scary jungle campsite. It was sufficiently creepy.
DAY FOUR
Shengyu gave me the glow stick she got from Llewell who was swinging it around during our walk in the dark previously! I like glow sticks.
Land expedition! I got to be navigator for the first station plus some. I found it very, very challenging, but then the most challenging tasks are the most exciting. It's only when you step out of your comfort zone that you start learning (ha). My bag was really light, because Sifei left due to sickness and took her clothes with her. Finally a light bag!
Llewell must've forgotten we needed lunch because we only ate at around 3pm after our 3rd checkpoint. It's okay, we threw red bean buns at him. Seriously, no one likes red bean buns. Not even Llewell. Or God. Does he? I dunno. Maybe we should start using iGod again.
Did I mention Tenzing's addiction to mosquito coils (notably Natalie)?
The last station got changed because we must've taken forever to finish lunch (where I stole Natalie's precious butter biscuits, by the way!) We trekked all the way back to Camp 2. By then I'd gotten sick of the stupid stream song. For heaven's sake! Sing something besides peace like a river and streams and fountains and all! (Oh, that was because Llewell invented this stupid rule that since we passed one of the gates, we'd have to sing songs every 5 minutes or we'd return to the gate - it failed later on anyway. Like the LON.) And then guess what? Revelation! Llewell invented CHANTING. The cause of Jingyi and Shuhui's mental illnesses. How nice.
Finally, Camp 2 was in our sight. We were relieved. Very relieved. We then had a cook-off with Shackleton, and it was pretty cool to see Jingyi but such think slices of carrot. =D And then Amanda scolded me for thinking that the whole cabbage bunch is just thrown into the soup like that. Aha ha. Then came apple crumble from the instructors! Happy happy tasty tasty! Also, sorry to Pei Jun for spilling some on her.
We then were assigned to wash up everything from dinner, and ended up half an hour late, missing our final activity. Then we got a long lecture from Llewell (FRIGGIN NAME IS SO IRRITATING TO TYPE ARGHH) about being late and reasons for said problem. And we ended up carrying VERY guilty hearts to set up our tents and shower. During sharing Hwee Min or someone mentioned dissappointing the instructors, and they said not to worry about it. That's beauty right there. No need to worry about the little things. Just worry about yourself. Worry about you, what you miss, what you gain, not about impressing or disappointing others - at least not all the time. That's the essence of simple living.
We camped out at the flat campsite behind the instructors' block, packed\unpacked belongings, all that.
DAY FIVE
Today! I was really, really sad. I didn't want to leave at all. We probably had the best end to our OBS course ever. Around 6.40 in the morning, just as the sun was rising and the moon still hung up high, we participatd in the signature JETTY JUMP! Free-falling is very appealing to me right now.
I went fourth or fifth this time. After you jump, the first thing you think is WHY AM I NOT TOUCHING THE WATER YET WHY AM I NOT TOUCHING THE WATER YET WHY AM I NOT TOUCHING THE WATER YET, then in a splash you land and a thousand litres of really salty soup enters your system. I don't know why, but the water was really, very, very much saltier than water nearer to the shore. But it was good, the sunrise was very pretty, and I saw a vertical cloud column, which I really liked.
Later on, we walked into a jungle path from the corner of the rock-climbing wall. So we had to go down a "well", crawl through a "sewer", then come up the other side. It was dry and it didn't smell too smelly. The smartypants who planned this challenge was really innovative. The tunnel was pitch black with three or four turns, and our OBS certificates hidden in the middle. After we emerged, all Natalie had was Hwee Min's crumpled certificate, without a pen or letter... Nice one, Natalie.
After that was pack! Wash! Scrub! Hang! Hook! Carry! Preperations to go home. Highlight of the day? Helping Shackleton hammer pegs while singing Disney songs in that manly operatic voice and fake vibrato. Well, I met Amber, who seems to be amused by such things. =D After that...Pay! Beg Llewell to finish his Nasi Lemak story! He told a weird guppy story instead! With no ending whatsoever! Still, funny while it lasted.
And so we took the boat and sang a really long rendition of the stream song (again), talked in British accents, told Hermione to stop eating my shit, had our bags checked by police, bought our souvenirs, and without a goodbye to any of our instructors and without seeing Marie again, we were quickly whisked away. Then we knew that we'd left the OBS atmosphere and returned to our hectic, messy, busy Singaporean lives. Wonderful. Just wonderful.
P.S. I'd like to thank everyone in Tenzing, plus our instructors and OBS. You made my day. Or week. Whatever.