Realm of the Imponderable

DDOC #12
Took my driving test today. I can’t say I passed with flying colours, but I did pass, even though the tester seemed intent on failing me, to judge by his perpetual frown and extremely critical tone. Oh well, he’s doing his job, and if one of the things it includes is to make sure new drivers don’t get a swelled head, he’s doing it very well.

Still, I can’t help but thing that there was a fair amount of luck involved, since these old men who administer driving tests seem to undergo mood swings about as often as any member of the human female species…

So that’s that… another load off my head for the time being, and many more to go.

DDOC #11
Had the busiest weekend for several months and set a new record in the process: 2 barbecues within a 24 hour period. One class gathering and one Sri Buat khaki party. Nice...

Also last weekend: driving lesson, dental appointment, dinner with some old friends, talk session with UMICH Singapore Student association. I shall think if it as good practice for what's to come in the next few months.


Well, to all the SA1 people who faithfully turned up, thanks for making the party a success, and we should do this more often.

DDOC #10
My friend’s favorite phrase in the army. Usually followed up with an order to do something ridiculous like washing the parade square or polishing his boots.
Seems like something we’re all doing a lot of these days. (I meant me and those out there who have finished their 2 ½ years of slave labor and are now waiting for term to start at whatever place it is that we have chosen to study in.)

I have, in the interest of slowing the inevitable decay of brain cells due to inactivity, resurrected a few old hobbies to kill time.
Thus, I have discovered a few things over the last few weeks: my pool sucks big time, my archery has improved due to all the exercise I got carrying sand bags and radio sets around, and my skills at King of Fighters are improving. I have begun to get bored with the various games I have here in the computer, which I think is a really bad sign.

So what does all this mean? It means that it’s mostly all a load of trash that I wrote up just to take space and keep you entertained. It also means that we’re growing up. Things that interested us before may not interest us so much now, and vice versa for things that didn’t interest us before.

Change is good, but keep an open mind and evaluate the changes going on and decide if it’s for the better. If not, then why make the change? Overcome your mental need for stability and let your feelings run wild. If you can let go of reality and rational thought too, all the better. That’s how new ideas come about. Where would we be if not for the combination of ideas gone awry and the eccentricities of a few people like Alexander graham bell (who seemed to think that hearing aids needed an attached microphone pointing towards the user and then latched on to the brilliant idea of turning his hearing aid into a communications device) or Einstein (who could never seem to match his socks)?

You only live once; If you want to live a stagnant life, so be it. I’d rather be the grasshopper

Posted by: Kai / 9:09 AM

DDOC #9
Had a reunion dinner with my NS buddies today. Pretty impressive; more than half of my battery turned up, which is pretty good attendance considering...
My old boss condescended to grace the occasion and foot the bill for the dinner, which probably came up to a fair amount since there were close to 40 people there. The point, they said, was to thank us all for our two years in their service (and to assist in the advancement of their careers). As SAF regular officers, their performance is judged somewhat by their handling of the men under their command and I dare say we were an exceptionally competent and skilled bunch of people. (in a way that will become apparent as you read further)

And what was it that motivated us to do well? It certainly wasn't the promised reward of a few extra days off from camp, nor the desire to actually come out tops is terms of performance, and even less so for the glory of our regular commanders.

No.

If fact, we weren't really motivated. We just seemed to be, and we are just actors in the great wayang show that is the SAF. We were not cambat ready; we were simply making the system work for us. The system built on the sheer stupidity, the failure of discipline and regimentation and the misconcepts that are omnipotent within the SAF combat units.

Let me elaborate:
What is it that MINDEF uses to judge the quality and combat readiness of its combat units? Statistics, results, whatever you like to call them. Statistics based on the percentage of people scoring a gold for their fitness test, the number of people getting marksmanship awards for their range tests, the observations made by neutral observers at various combat evaluation exercises and so on. They do not judge the attitude of the men or the specialists or the officers. They do not see what goes on in the unit when there are no testers or inspectors around.

Hence, much of these statistics, like fitness and range test results can be easily doctored. Or various stunts can be pulled, like distributing magic (otherwise known as "surplus") rounds at ranges so that people who miss can get an extra go at the target. And ditto for the exercises. Evaluators cannot be around everywhere to see everything that goes on, and they need their own beauty rest too. So what happens? Stunts, shortcuts happen. People who follow the ridiculously kiasu safety rules (such as removing equipment piece by piece from the truck) end up taking longer to complete their tasks and so get penalised. People who compromise "safety" lose points too; so the solution is to do away with the stupid safety rules, make our own (we instead ensure that nobody is in the way, then throw equipment out of the truck in armfulls), and use them when the evaluators aren't looking. Conversely, we can argue that something took a long time to do because of the "necessary" extra safety checks that had to be made and that we shouldn't be penalised for the "sluggishness".

That's one thing I find the most annoying: evaluators can't make up their mind, only look out for mistakes and point out nitty-gritty things like: "there's a hole in your camouflage net. Why?" or "why is your antenna mast not extended to its maximum height?". Don't they realise that the camouflage net IS made up of holes tied together, and that if radio comms are through there is no need to extend the antenna and thus create more work for us when we pack up and also make us more outstanding to enemy scouts who can probably spot the mast sticking out like a 10 metre long flagpole from ten miles away? (and don't they also realise how idiotic they sound making all these stupid comments and asking all these irrelevant questions?)

Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that statistics are easily doctored and evaluators are too stupid to make any accurate judgement on a unit's combat readiness.

So what does that mean?

The battery that I spent 2 years of my NS life with is a group of people who knows exactly how to bend rules, how to negotiate with unreasonable people and probably merely adequate for the demands of a full scale war.

It also means that the SAF is comprised of ground units that are either incompetant or merely adequate, and high ranking officers who appoint stupid people to rate the performance of the ground units and delude themselves into thinking that their active combat units are fit, motivated and highly trained professional soldiers.

What a truly wonderful army

DDOC #8
Oh it's a lazy sunday morning.. tum-teetum

My fathers sunday morning breakfast (at least the times when I actually manage to wake up in time to go, which is about once a month or so) gives new meaning to the word "slumming". We'd have as unhealthy a breakfast you can possible get in a hot, sweaty coffee shop situated in the middle of Serangoon with traffic trundling by and food that leaves enough grease on my hands to wax my entire figurine collection. But, hey, that's what slumming is all about; and for once it's living to eat and not eating to live... (You do know the difference, don't you?)

Eating to live is what everyone in the army not privelaged to the canteen or any other source of good food does. Living to eat, on the other hand, is what the authors of Makan Sutra do for a living. And probably a good number of people (those who really enjoy their food) too.

So what is it that drives people to travel far and wide for the "best" food available? The same thing that keeps people awake during one-nighters at the local LAN shop happily reducing each other to little stains on the computer generated wall, or the same thing that compels one to wake up at the crack of dawn just so that they can be the first to lay hands on a new book. It is the degree of pleasure that one takes in these activities. People have been known to go to great lengths to find new, unique or better sources of pleasure.

That raises a little question: how far are people willing to go? What about the persuit of happiness? is there any pleasure in that? If there isn't, then the offer of short cuts, the easy way up, is extremely tempting. Equally disturbing is the possibility that a sufficiently large reward will compel anyone to do anything. If we were to succumb to such temptations, how much better will we be than an animal which does tricks for the reward of food? We will have effectively dehumanized ourselves.

I can only hope that more people consider the persuit of happiness to be a joy in itself and to strive for goals of their own choosing and not those set by others offering payment in exchange of service. The achievement of our own personal goals brings with it not only the rewards of the goal itself, but also a sense of accomplishment. To me, it is sometimes this sense of achievement that is the greater reward.

Strive as we may for ourselves, we should never forget that there are others around us who may need help. Selfishness is a self-destructive quality and he who ignores the needs of others will soon find himself facing the perils of the world alone.

Never underestimate the importance of friends or the value of friendship.

DDOC #7
Oh? it's been a week from my first posting. How time flies....

Went to the archery range today. It's nice to be out in the open again, with the only flaw to the otherwise perfect afternoon being the presence of rainclouds overhead threatening to unleash the entire contents of heaven's sewers. Nevertheless, it was nice to find out that after almost a year of neglict my archery skills have not noticeable degraded. Must be all that carrying of sandbags, radio sets and other rubbish I did in camp under the guise of "nation building" or "national service"... Well, my bow did seem a little easier to draw this time. Maybe it's time for me to get a heavier bow...

How do I spend my days?
Let me count the ways

DDOC #6
Another Philosophical Rambling:
One quote from T3:"No fate but what we make" suggests that we are the controllers of our future, but events in the movie seem to go contrary to what they say here. One little cock up from our directors, hmm? Or are they so devious as to put it so just to make (possibly)misguided fans like me run around in circles trying to figure out what they're trying to say?

Throwing the movie aside, this is a question that bears pondering. If everything is predestined, then where is our "free will"? All that our democratically elected leaders have been telling us that we elected them is bullshit; it was predestined. Just the same way that toast is always predestined to fall with the buttered side down and Mr bush was predestined to be the president, no matter what an idiot and retard he has proven himself to be.

On the other hand, lets say that the future is wholly ours to create, that we have all the power to shape what lies ahead of us. We would be proceeding without any guidance, without any help from anything other than ourselves. That seems to contradict what every religious practitioner believes in. That means that half the world is comprised to deluded people mistakenly practicing false beliefs.

So either half the world is deluded into thinking that we can control our destiny and the other half correctly believes that there is a higher being, some entity beyond our awareness and comprehension that has a hand in our fate, or half the world blindly puts faith in something that doesn't exist to help guide them to a better future and the rest of the world correctly believes that the future is in their hands and thus strive to create a better future for themselves.

Disturbing possibilities aren't they?

DDOC #5
All you people out there who haven't watched T3 should go watch it. If not for the action than for the pretty babes, and if you care to ponder about any of the questions about fate that the movie puts forward, well, go right ahead......
Oh, and the directors actually managed to use Arnie's inability to do more than one-liners to pretty good effect. Basic, utilitarian language in a monotone delivered in blunt, in-your-face honesty no matter what the situation is. Well done, developers

DDOC #4

Went swimming today with Kelvin. First time in months and I ain't getting any better at it.. (and neither is he)
Spent the rest of the afternoon looking for a pirated cd shop to buy win XP. They're amazingly difficult to find nowadays. The Singapore police are doing a wonderful job of bashing up pirated cds and that's both a good and bad thing. Good in the sense that they're ensurnig software developers are getting their due but bad because that leaves the developers to charge us as much as they like for their stuff. (See DDOC #2) And Some of them certainly can afford to charge more reasonable prices. (ie. the goddamn shit-filthy rich people like bill gates) Piracy, in my view, is good in moderation. Can't those developers take the fact that people are so eager to pirate their products as a sign that they're producing good stuff? And there are people who do buy original software if the price is right and the product is good.

Anyway I got my winXP and I wish good luck to all you people out there looking for pirated windows cds. In a way Bill gates did us all a favor by getting so filthy rich. I'll never feel guilty about buying stuff pirated from HIM, no matter how good it may be...

DDOC #3

Your Ultimate Purity Score Is...
Category	Your Score	Average
Self-Lovin'	70% Explored the pleasures of the flesh	64.5%
Shamelessness	100%	79%
Sex Drive	89.5% The Pope is envious	77.3%
Straightness	33.9% Done the nasty, but not creatively	44.2%
Gayness	100%	82.7%
Fucking Sick	97.3% Refreshingly normal	89.6%
You are 79.8% pure Average Score: 72.1%
Take The Ultimate Purity Test and see how you match up!

DDOC #2
Ladida... sitting at home twanging away. I got my Umich email working! Maybe someday I'll actually get around to putting together a proper website using the facilities at Umich..
Went to Funan this afternoon looking for laptops. Nada... Didn't see anything I liked but then again I don't like laptops in general. Just went to kill time and decide that a desktop is much more practical in michigan and I can always use my SuperPalm for anything I need to record down on the fly.
Palm software is just as bad as normal software.. You pay hundreds for a cd that contains probably a fraction of what you need to keep your computer trundling just ahead of the stone age. Unfortunately, piracy doesn't consider palm software to be a viable market so unless you're looking for cds crammed with shareware, you'd find no palm software in pirate shops. So....guess what yours truly very impulsively did?
yep.. $189 for a palm version of MS office.. Hey, if anyone ever wants Documents to Go premium just give me a call. Unlike most other programs once you install this baby you can lose the cd and you won't have any problems running the thing........
(which means, if you haven't figured it out, you can borrow my cd, happily install everything with the registration number and return me the cd and your palm or computer won't be any the wiser, stupid)
Strangely enough my mom didn't make as big a hole in the ceiling as she did when she first found out about the earring...

DDOC #1
Just came back from one of my ritual Back to Nature trips. As-the-usual, there were no catastrophic or miraculous events but then again not everyday in sunday. I regard every trip as a learning experience. There's plenty to learn even if you've done the same thing a thousand times. I just think we ought to appreciate nature a little more and I also have realised the value of retrospect.. (of other people, of course.) An old friend of mine used to have a favorite saying "get used to it". When you're down, out in field camp or somebody frags you with a railgun from 10000metres, instead of going "shit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!", get used to it. When you look back later, you'll actually think that it wasn't really that bad. You may not want to do it again, but if you keep an open mind instead of wallowing in your own pitiful misery, you'll learn something and ultimately come out the richer or wiser. (and hopefully next time you're on the other end of the slug at 10000metres and the guy who slugged you is on the receiving end)

All this discussion started when my cousin who came along on this trip asked me about the army and I gave him a rundown of my own personal experiences. Not willing to give the SAF credit and make it seem like a holiday camp and unwilling to take the blame should he get a bad impression, I just recounted what I experienced and listening to myself, it didn't really sound that bad. So that's that... I can truthfully say I learnt alot and also there were many times when you could hear my cursing and swearing in camp from the block opposite the road.. (except for the time I was at Tekong, in which case you'd hear the instructors cursing and swearing from the mainland...)

Back to nature.

I think true achievement is not when we bend nature to our will, but when we cooperate with her for mutual benefit. Sure, she's one harsh bitch sometimes but then again, what are we but grains of sand in the desert? It's not an achievement for nature to pound us flat with some volcano or hurricane, nor when we build the tallest skyscraper or the biggest city but it is when we learn to appreciate beautiful landscapes that aren't artificially tamed or pockmarked with buildings or pylons. We can't reverse the encroaching of the concrete jungle but we can do our bit to conserve what's left.

The world is not your oyster, It's your home. Don't eat it; you know what comes out the other end...

Hmm hmm... Think I just figured out how to get photos on this thing. (many thanks, Jo, for your help) HTML is a real pain in the ass...; I'm just cutting and pasting so that what comes out looks right because it looks similar to the other clumps of (non)sense surrounding it. At least I got links set up... More when I figure it all out.

Finally come over (or was it overcome?) the inertia to do anything with this blog I created for the fun of it. I forsee a crateload of crap coming out of this here, (thanks to Jo, for encouraging me into this....)
Ah, well, the road of life is littered with good intentions and excellent plans but unfortunately there's no cleaner to pick up after you........ You gotta pick up your own litter, man.