My 7 days field camp spanned from 4th Feb to 11th Feb. It's quite a unique and memorable experience i would say. Before the start of it, everyone was already mentally prepared for a tough field camp. We were told by our commanders that Ninja field camp would be different from other companies. It was really up to us to feel it and go through the field camp. And so i went....
Our first day started off with an 8km route march from company line to our first camp site: reclaimed land. I would say that this was the most hated campsite after going through the whole field camp. Its really very muddy and they are lots of insects and small animals. Centipede bites were common. To add to the woes, it rained upon reaching the campsite and we were already wet before pitching our bashas. Pitching of bashas were really a headache to us. The alignment of bashas caused alot of problems. Standardization across the entire platoon wasted quite alot of time. We had 20 minutes to build it, and obviously we didn't beat the timing. They started to tekan us ( oops they call it development) We had totear down our bashas and fall in in FBO (full battle order). These happened repeatedly and it was really draining. Pushups prevail.. I would say the whole afternoon was spent like that. But following the low morale of our platoon, the OC allowed us to cook magie mee using our mess tins for dinner. It sort of lifted our morale by a little as compared to eating the much dreaded combat rations. Night was falling, and pitch darkness soon descended. At night, movement is really slow. We cant really make out our way, and had to use torchlights. however, we are supposed to be tactical too, which means we cant shine our torch light so blatantly. we could only shine it at one instant to look at where we are heading and had to switch it off immediately. Also we had to use the red lens which was black taped to leave just a small square in the middle of the circular red lens. This again is for tactical reason. Our commanders told us they wont want to see Deepavali ( Festival of Lights) meaning that everyone shown their torchlights everywhere. Time seems to fly at night, probably because of the slow movement. We had our first powder bath that night. Its quite an interesting experience. We all fall in in half section level, and started stripping, leaving only our underwears on. Then we started to sprinkle powder everywhere on our body. We helped each other powder our backs. We had to let the commanders check our body after we finished, so we felt the pressure to make sure our body had sufficient powder. I recalled having to do pushups too because some of us didn't pass the inspection,lol. Powder bath can be said to be a relaxing time after a hard day. There was also a procedure called "check clear" during the inspection of our powder bath. When the commander told us to check clear, we had to snap our briefs to witness the smoke caused by the powder in our groin area. Thats to ensure we had powder bath our "private parts". Quite humourous really, cause one blur person in our platoon literally held his rifle and check clear!! Another thing was our Camou. We had to camou on and off repeatedly for failing to execute it to perfection. They wanted to see us helping each other. We had a time frame of one minute to put on our green and black camou. Quite short, but can be done if we helped each other. The feeling of rubbing away our camou and putting it on again is unpalatable, but its part and parcel of training. Used to it i would say, just that camou creams are expensive and ya it is really wasteful... haha.
Our second campsite was at an oil palm plantation. We marched 4km from reclaimed land to oil palm. Upon reaching there, we had IFC training. Fire control movement. There were lectures by commanders. Pitching of bashas again. Similarly disastrous. Its the terrain that makes it difficult to align. Trees werent straight. We had problems again. Oh and i got guard duty on that day. Haiz, i went upfront to refill water bottles without bringing my "wife" along ( rifle lor) I lost my ID tag too.. That culminated to a guard duty. I rmb my guard duty was at 12pm to 2am. That day was basically rainy. We carried lightsticks and patrolled the campsites. Some guard duty personnel did sentry duty. Sentry pp just need to sit down. at the commanders tentage. we rotated our duties so as not to get bored. Yea of course he next day we were very tired after getting insufficient sleep. But throughout the entire field camp i didn't got enough rest. I woke up almost every hour of my sleep. We had to ensure that our rifles were properly secured to us during our sleep so as not to get stunned my commanders. I guess its probably a sub conscious instinct that made me wake up almost every our to check on my rifle. I didn't detest guard duty, instead i regarded it as a unique experience. I thought that would be part and parcel of field camp.
Third day was still at oil palm. Not much recollections on it.4th Day was our technical break. We had FCO movement in section level. Our sec com gave us alot of pressure, keep on scolding and yelling at us, making us feel like idiots. One of my section mates broke into tears... anyway, he did feel better after the whole event. We were all looking forward to our technical break which was on the Fourth day. They promised half a day not to touch us. We would have a time to bath and change into new uniform. But before that, we had to leopard crawl and back crawl in the mud. The commanders said since we would get to bath after that, it doesnt matter if we get dirty now. The rationale for doing these crawling is training us for BIC(Battle Innoculation Course). Haha, whatever.... our green uniform became totally brown. Our SBO was totally immersed in mud. Really Really uncomfortable. Well, the fact that we would get to bath had got us in pretty high spirits. haha, so we actually did the crawling quite willingly... We were very much refreshed after the bath. And the best thing was we had our first meal of fresh rations from the cookhouse. Its really tasty as compared to the combat rations that we had eaten for the past few days. what chicken pontay rice, oriental seafood noodle,glutinous rice,pasta.... etc... all cmi.... really sux... We really appreciate the cookhouse food now after so many days of combat ration. After our lunch, we started our rifle cleaning. Needless to say, our time were burnt cleaning rifles, and our so called technical break came to an end quickly. Dusk arrived swiftly... And life was back to darkness...
On the Fifth day of field camp, we proceeded to our last campsite at permatang,a rubber plantation. We marched 8km there, fortunately only with our SBO. We were greeted by the sea breeze upon reaching there. The strong sea breeze sent tree branches swaying to a large degree, and we were all refreshed by the breeze. Of course we were worried abt pitching our bashas in the strong wind, but to our relief we manage to did it the second time. (after being tekkaned the first time) 17 minutes were all the time we took... lol our best record time :p There was a hill behind us, so it was uphill all the way. From the first instance i saw such terrrain, i could almost immediately visualise the type of punishment they could make us do. And they did. As usual, we went for training in the jungle areas again, with all our immediate assault drills, fire movement to the rear, FCO, arti drills,sniper drills... lol i hate arti drills... its really crazy... running like mad. Its worse if they was a casualty. I rmb i was chosen as casualty during the sniper drill.. They had difficulty carrying me back. Luckily it was only for a short distance when the commander changed it to an arti drill and recovered me. But it was no better too.. it was an arti drill!!! so its sheer sprinting till your lungs burst. That night, it was weird. The RO was that we had to fall in by 0700 the next morning, which was quite unusual because the usual fall in timing was 0630. They claimed that we had nothing much the next day, so they gave us more time to rest. We were elated upon hearing that, but was instantly dismayed and shocked when a turnout occured the next day 0600 hrs. Commanders threw thunderflash everyway, and it continued for some time. blank shots were also fired. It was a simulation for wartime.. I was taken aback, and at the same time at a loss of what to do. We werent briefed on such occasions, but after some time i regained my consciousness and began to wore my helmet and SBO, getting ready to fall in. It was after quite some time that i saw my buddy tearing down my basha that i realised that we had to fall in in full battle order. EVERYTHING. As fast as we could, but still facing the constraint of pitch darkness, we tried to hurry. Many ppl havent packed their items in their field packs yet, and as a result they had some items missing when they fall in that morning. It was just pandemonium. Of course "development" ensued. Carried on for one hour or so.
Sixth day: After the turnout, we had breakfast, and then started building our shell scrape. The whole day was basically spent digging. The weather was kind initially, pouring sufficiently to loosen the soil for us, but not so when we eventually finished digging. It was raining cats and dogs. We were very glad that we did not sleep in our shell scrape that night. We were relocated to sispec grounds due to the rain. It was already like 12 when we arrived at sispec. One of the highlights of the day was when we got to eat fresh rations from cookhouse for dinner. Guess what? its western food :) It was raining then, and platoon by platoon we gathered in the admin tent for dinner. OC rushed us, cos there were still others who havent eat, and besides we have to relocate quickly. But nevertheless it was an enjoyable meal. We slept at sispec area, preparing for the final day of field camp. Our morale was more or less close to high.
Seventh Day: That morning we had some GST again.. but this time we only aimed to clear our rounds. haha... we ate in a training shed at sispec, then proceed towards BIC grounds. It was drizzling and we were waiting darn long. Apparently most of us dozed off. We camou our face with a letter N representing ninja instead of the usual 3 stripes. It was a long wait before we eagerly set off for leopard crawling and back crawling. haha... it was not that tough as compared to our previous "rehearsals" It was less muddy too, more sand i would say. Anyway, we were in very high spirits after that. It was really like "CHIONG AR!!" Go back company line.. We boarded the tunnel back. A home sweet home man! We henta kaki.. we took a photo with our commanders, wanted to hug them. They threatened us in a humourous way, gave us pushups, but we nv yielded...lol.. but we only managed to hug one of our commanders. Our sec com actually... haha... he wasnt that reluctant afterall, nv run away immediately after phototaking...
So that pretty much completed my journey abt field camp. It was really meaningful and memorable. Learnt about surviving outfield independently. Personal accountability. Taking care of ur friends and ur stores. All these are impt lessons which i gathered. I appreciated other stuff better, for eg the food, the living conditions in bunk, and my home, my family, my personal free time. Its a good experience, and i am proud to say that i survived ninja field camp!
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