anything that's worth having
booked out at 8 yesterday, booking in today at 9, and we are instucted to write and essay. where got time. but still, it is writing, something which i enjoy, so it still isn't all that bad. here's what i managed to conjure in a little over 30 minutes, trying to make full use of the time that i have available, and i decided that i would past it here too, since i haven't written much here, probably won't be doing so for some time still.
My defining moment in BTM
BMT, to me, is many things. It is a source of both excitement and dread, a furnace where friendship and brotherhood is forged, a strange concoction agony and amazement; pain and pride that swells inside of me every time I pull through difficult times together with my platoon.
Nonetheless, one moment - I feel – is quintessentially BMT, and that moment is the parade in which I was presented my rifle.
I was presented my rifle on my third or forth day in BMT (time dose has a habit of warping altogether in here), and I was awakened early in the morning, absolutely clueless as to what was happening, before being marched to the parade ground near the ferry terminal, from which I could gaze at the shores of Singapore mainland, the place that I missed so, my home.
“With this rifle I will defend my country,” was what I was instructed to shout, and that was exactly what I bellowed when I collected my rifle, without truly understanding what it meant.
I’ve now come to a little more comprehension about what defending my country entails, and it is epitomised by my rifle.
Defending my country is to defend my home, my way of life - it is to defend my loved ones, and it is a weight that every Singaporean son has to take up on his shoulders: it is our duty.
So too is my rifle: a load slung over my shoulder, and one never does realise just how heavy the rifle really is until one has to carry it on a road march, much alike how one can never truly recognise the true gravity of the burden of both defending one’s home until BMT.
Defending my way of life calls for sacrifice, even if it is cumbersome and at times bothersome, requiring my to alter the lifestyle that I’ve grown accustomed to over the past twenty years, give up my time, and disrupting my studies. In a like manner, my rifle seems more like a curse than a gift during IOC, bulky and unintuitive, like a sluggish and awkward extra limb that sprouted spontaneously out of my chest. Worst of all was digging a shell-scrape with a rifle slung across my back, digging into my flesh with every corresponding plunge of my excavating blade into the soil.
My rifle has to be with my at all times, placed over my shoulder as I consume my ration, slung over my as I use the latrine, and ever tied around my hand, beside me when I sleep. Similarly, defending my loved ones is my cause for everything that I do in BMT. From training to be physically fit, to training to be proficient in urban operations, to being lectured on the technical aspects of my SAR 21 rifle, to being lectured by my commanders on the discipline that is required from all soldier – just like how my rifle is always to be with me, my conviction to defend those whom I claim to love is the very foundation and motivation for everything that I do in BMT.
Just like how every Singaporean son has to take up his duty to serve and protect his nation that has given him and his family much, everyone of us here has to pick up our rifles, sling it across our backs and form up - chins up, shoulders squared and backs straight, ready.
I still do not grasp the full implication of defending my country, and the significance of the parade that day, the day when I was presented my rifle. I do, however, intend to experience more, and learn more as BMT goes on, and even beyond, even after I pass out of BMT.