OBS. IT'S FUN!

Just don't wonder why the others hate OBS so much. Maybe it's because they were in Camp2 (the "ulu" campsite built since 1967) and we were in Camp1 (the modern campsite with good facilities).

On Wednesday morning, after the History paper check at 7am (I got 36/50 for the exam), we went to Punggo Jetty to take a boat to OBS @ Pulau Ubin. The people who were going to Camp2 went off first while we went later. The watch I was in is named Kurt, the founder of Outward Bound, and Faisal is our instructor. And he ROX!

1st day of OBS
We did the "trust fall", "lead the blindfolded", etc in the morning. These activities rely on our trust on our teammates to go on smoothly. In the afternoon, we climbed a wooden pole: a practice for rock climbing. These activities require ABCD: Assisstant belayer, Belayer, Climber, Dead weight. When I was climber, I did not "shioked" as much when falling as the belayer was not quite there and the rope was slack. Never mind that lah. Next we also pitched our "A-tents" which Faisal described as easiest to pitch. Our campsite faces the sea but was inside a jungle. The ground looked like it was dug around earlier, and it smells of shit. So the popular inference was that others who had camped here shitted here also. We also cooked our dinner by the sea. Rice was not bad if you like it watery. I and Zhihao cooked some corn & mushroom soup, which was quite nice. We didn't cook curry chicken as others already cooked it. It was nice. Supper was green bean soup. We went to sleep later.

2nd day of OBS
In the morning, we climbed a slab of the rock walls. We were told that OBS's seven-eleven is having a sale, and we will get discounted prices to buy our lunch: bread, buscuits, raisins, etc. Climbing one panel above the red line (which is 3 meters above ground) will earn us 10 dollars. I climbed twice. I completed the first time I tried to climb and earned $70, but I only deserve $50 for the 2nd climb. However, they recorded me to complete the climb and added $20 to my 2nd earning so as to get a $1700 as a whole watch. It tests our toughness in the mind and body as we also need a strong mind to climb to the top. In the afternoon, we have games like "touch the numbers in the acid pool", which requires us to touch with our left hand a ring of numbers unarranged in the shortest time possible, as we were competing with another watch, Bo Seng. We also need to do "mass rope jumping", which tests the whole watch's coordination, and "wood sleighs" which also tests the same thing. Before supper, we had a "solo night walk" which is to walk from deep inside the jungle back to Camp1. Although it's easy and not that challenging, we were given time to relax while walking in the dark. (to me, it did not test on my courage, which it should). Anyway, the night was bad as it rained in the day and the tent got very wet, but not as bad as other watches' tents, which collapsed due to rain and wind and possibly, a wild boar.

3rd day of OBS
We learnt to KAYAK! and we learnt to capsize... Noon was the time we should set off for our next campsite by kayaking (but fortunately not Camp2), but a Cat-1 rain made us go only around 4pm. Thanks to the tide, we got to the campsite at 5.30pm, which was surprisingly fast according to our instructors. Kayaking was the most fun as it was very "shiok"! Waves generated by certain ships also increased the "funness". While transporting the kayaks up the slopes, there were cooperating people and others of the opposite characters. Gek Fong raced with other Dhanabalanians to see if who can carry a 20-litre jerrycan to the campsite the fastest. While pitching our tents, the spastic Meng carried his torch high upon his head, as if giving us light in the dark to pitch our tents. But he was actually searching for birds in the sky! Damn pissed. He did nothing but to take advantages and criticise certain parts he didn't like. The natural environment of our campsite made us impossible to get access to fresh water, so we relied on our 3 jerrycans. We also cooked food, but only after we ate packets of uncooked maggie mee. We had sardines, mushrooms, ikan bilisses, mee, etc and it was tasty. We slept early after a "bedtime story" by Zhi Hao, which was a montage of Emily of Emerald Hill and a rape scene, which had no link at all. Here part of the story: Once upon a time, there was a bad boy named (what's your name?) (Marcus) The boy is called Marcus. One day, he went to a brothel and raped somebody. Let's describe the rape scene. SUSIE AH! EMILY HERE AH! This afternoon I'm going to town. Anything that you're needing?...

4th day of OBS
We trekked back to our campsite and we have to search for 3 checkpoints by only given a map, compass and map grid references. A checkpoint was near a junction, another was in Camp2 grounds and another was beside a grave, which was accessible by walking through a jungle in a small path away from the main route. We did 50 pumpings after arriving at our store, as we were late by ~6 minutes from our projected timing when trekking back from Camp2. We had a "discount" as we were supposed to do 20 push-ups per minute late. We packed up, cleared the store, and went to the souvenir shop, where I bought a black OBS T-shirt. We also got back our items taken away from the camp: money, wallet, handphones, etc. After receiving a handband, a pen and a cert, we took a ship back to Punggol.

OBS was generally challenging but fun, and I liked it a lot, partly because of our very good instructor. Cheers for Faisal and OBS!