Holy shit I just realized that I have not updated for nearly half a year. In my defense, I did occasionally think about coming up here but seriously, year 3 life had been nothing but busy.
My archives for Jan - May this year will hence be non-existent.
Poof. Gone in the wind.
Finding the time to update now cos the monstrous CTs are now over and I just went through level camp @ OBS. :) Some lies... I typed that in May and I got so tired and fell asleep that I totally forgot about continuing this draft. Oh well. Better late than never, hence I guess I'll continue with some of the most major events of this year (and my life), which is OBS.
Beware, long post ahead! You have been warned.
OBS @ Pulau Ubin, 13 May - 17 May 2013
So when school first started this year, I was sitting in my new (and foreign) classroom with Zoey and everything feels strange. The classroom seemed smaller, I don't know half the people here in this room, the ceiling was too damn high and I'm not used to it. My mind was drifting off to level camp last year (fun fact: 4 out of 6 of us girls who were in the same tent ended up as classmates!) and suddenly, I just had a really strong urge to go camping again. I don't really know why. Suddenly I missed camp bag-packing, how the high elements felt, tent pitching, and stuff. So I silently wished that there was camp this year and that I don't have to wait one freaking year for my next adventure camp. My feels are weird and random.
Then there was all this hype all around our level about not receiving an orientation tee this year. Honestly, I was quite disappointed too because I was kind of bored with wearing the same few shirts for choir PT (call me weird but y2 camp tee and red choir tee are a strict NO for me to wear to PT) (hence "same few shirts") (don't ask why) and was kind of hoping to receive another school based tee. After that, news started to spread around that it's okay that we did not have a level tee, because there will be an upcoming
event to get our y3 level tee soon. So when I read that I was quite shocked and wondered if it was camp. And you know what, that silent wish I made came true. We received an official schedule letter next week and we are indeed having an adventure camp at OBS.
Term one passed in a flash, term 2 was tough like crazy and then we had CTs. The moment CTs ended, the y4s had to go for OBS straightaway (Ikr that probably sucked. They had it tougher with more hardcore mugging, and then go through camp.) When they came back there were a lot of "advice" from seniors flooding in telling us what to stock up on, what to do and what not to do etc. It was also a y3-spam-asking-y4-questions frenzy over the weekends. D:
So.. the big day arrived, and I headed to school without any sleeping bag. Went to collect solid fuel with Huizhi and then got my share of it. Took a bus to the obs reception center at Punggol (super ugh I came to school at 7 just to go back to somewhere near my place.) and that was when we split into our watches. The 3F kids were in consecutive watches and we sat at the back of the rows so we formed this ultra huge circle and tried to play concentration haha!
Later there were some admin stuff going on and the OBS representatives were telling us our watch names. It was quite funny because the mic wasn't very good and the names he said were unheard of too like "Batutta" & "Amundsen", which makes us all go "WHAT??!" even after he repeated it twice. Then when it was our watch the guy went "Cheng Ho" and at that moment thought it was the most ridiculous sounding name ever. So basically our whole watch was quite confused and the guy looked at us, then was like "oh.. you know.. uh.. 郑和?" and that was when the moment of realization kicked in. I'm sure most of us would know who he is if we paid the slightest attention during acc but seriously? Zheng He sounds so much nicer than Cheng Ho. Cheng Ho. Cheng Ho. Cheng Ho..? (The more I repeated it then, I thought it sounded slightly less absurd.)
Us at our most random moments.
We then went to meet out instructor Jiayi and we had to go through introduction and all again. It was definitely awkward because we stood in two distinct classes. At that moment I hoped to get to know the other class more over the next few days, like on the bright side, at least Yanlin's there! :) A piece of advice: don't bother buying general meds for cough/flu/fever/diarrhea/vomiting because they will be taken for safekeeping. Took a ferry to Pulau Ubin and reached Camp 2. I liked the feel of the atmosphere there: brick houses, open fields, sea view, etc. :D We then went to get lunch, but with a special request: to bring plastic bags along. Turns out, we were given a variety of dry goods (breads to biscuits to cakes) and dinners (rice and canned foods) which we had to ration among ourselves. We have to control our "happy food" which would make up 4 lunches and 3 breakfasts. There would only be two fresh meals this camp. Quite an eye opener because I wouldn't have expected to feed on bread and biscuits for my lunch, but it wasn't that bad: there was also packets of milo, horlicks, coffee (which we have to boil our own water if we want it) and also fruits.
Went to the Cheng Ho store and started to do store check. Basically, all the tents, cooking materials, life jackets, haversacks and stuff were inside there for us to take. The front door of our store didn't have a key so we had to go to the tiny backdoor. the sun was bloody hot and we had to fold the countless groundsheets, ponchos and tents at the small grass patch at the backyard, when all the others had all the space in the world on the front porch! We then proceeded to go for trust fall, which was pretty cool. It wasn't as scary as it seems and when I fell, I simply fell onto the sheet everyone help to with a light thud. I actually kind of expected the sheet to press in haha! We also had our belaying activity and it was so cool, like, at OBS you have to form belay teams among your friends. No professionals around like all the past camps. You manage that rope which is responsible for the safety of your friend when they are like 10m above ground in the air :(
We went to pitch our tents (and the same grasshoppers from year 2 camp came back!!) and then had outdoor dinner at night when Jiayi taught us how to cook rice using solid fuel, how to open cans and how to manage our trash, which was such a pain in the ass may I add. It's like we have to remove the labels and keep them aside to recycle later. Then we must open the can, empty the contents into mess tins, and then open the other end as well. Finally, flatten the can with your shoes and keep them into a container. It sounds simple but seriously, try opening even half the perimeter of the can. Then you'll know why we complain about having to do so, both ends, for 12 cans. The bottom of the mess tins have to be coated with toothpaste before being set into the fuel stove. We had to share tin cans and eat in the dark, which was pretty disastrous because all the food started dripping onto our ground sheet when you can't see shit. There was also kind of not enough 2nd helpings of rice to go around. Nothing much to say other than hearing Sherman comment "This is the first time I'm so glad to eat vegetarian food.." on the 罗汉斋. Had to clean our pots and tins as well as the ground sheet, which was now stained with sauces and basically it reeked of a bad smell the next few days because of sardine stains. barely enough sponges and detergent to go around and I had to dig for wet tissues and then walk up the 101 steps to our cooking area where Hui Jun had been guarding our stained ground sheet alone. We were all basically, sweaty and drained from the days activities and were glad when we were given the OK to shower after we met Jiayi with cleaned equipment and we planned the items we wanted to pack for our expeditions. Toilets were cleaner
than expected. Had a fire drill at night and when we were sent off to sleep, our watch gathered again to talk about the day as well as receive a safety briefing from Jiayi on preventing sunburns, first-aid, what to do in a bees attack and more. Became tent mates with Kenisha, Deniece and Yanlin (yeah only 4 ppl per tent!) and we were complaining how hot and stuffy it was lol. It was not bad sleeping on bare ground and I fell asleep easily.
DAY 2: Woke up at 5.30 plus due to noises around our tent and realised that almost everyone were up already. Decided to abandon out tent and head down to wash up first but to our horror, we discovered our store room was locked. It was already 5.55am and we were supposed to gather at 6.30, there seemed to be no hope of washing up anytime soon and we have yet to unpitch our tents. More of us appeared wondering who took the keys away but anyway, we got the keys and managed to get our stuff. Packed our bags which was quite a bad experience because we had to squeeze so much shit, both your own stuff, group stuff and for us girls, the guys' personal belongings cause the tent basically took up their whole bag. It was so heavy and though I did survive bringing it to the jetty and onto the safety boat, I seriously doubted how I was going to survive land expedition with those bags. After loading our stuff onto the safety boat we had our water confidence test when we stepped into the sea together as a circle and tried floating in the "superman" position and also lying down on the water. There was a lot of screaming and it was mad fun. XD Then we learnt how to deliberately capsize our kayak. Halfway through it started to rain so we had to move all our kayaks onto the shore and help the other groups as well. Gathered at the nearby block wet and cold from the wind, and we had lunch there. Some people got hurt by the edgy rocks near the shore. Overall, not a good experience at that point of time. :( When the sky cleared we lined our kayaks again, finished capsizing and now we had to learn a rescue drill, which was how to save your friends when your kayak capsizes in the middle of the sea. It was quite genius but anyway, the jist is to first drain the kayak of water, flip it over then get into it. Quite a tedious process! :x Finanlly we were given the OK to kayak to our destination and you know what, Hui Jun and I lost control of our kayak so badly because we didn't know how to change directions. We started to go haywire and headed towards the opposite direction into the jetty, which we were warned to never hit it because we will capsize and get hurt. So it was pretty much the two of us heading for the jetty, screaming and panicking while this other instructor on a kayak was also screaming stuff at us. HAHA. Then we got lucky cos there was this instructor who was on the jetty and he started shouting instructions to us, telling Hui Jun and I where to paddle, and that was pretty much how we got away from danger and learnt how to change directions lol. We kayaked further away after joining our watchmates and we did the rescue drill in the middle of the sea, took quite long to complete the rescue drill cos we couldn't get our kayak to flip over :/ Finally kayaked to our destination (camp 1) and saw many stuff on the way, from shoes to dead fishes LOL. And since we were cheng ho, all of us were making jokes about 郑和下西洋 HAHA.
And when we reached camp 1, we had quite a shock because camp 1. was. like. a. freaking. holiday. resort. not even kidding. The facilities were really good and new with great design. I swear our whole watch was silently complaining haha. There was also this super huge high e called the inverse tower, which was 35m up. All the dunmanians there were also staring at all of us who were wet and shagged, well, didn't they have a good time thus far! We had to grab our haversacks from the safety boat and the sight of us with super huge bags just makes us look so much more miserable to them haha. We then placed all our stuff to a void deck under a building and was given a tour of the place, there was swimming pool, instructor's lodge, so many high e facilities, envious much! Then we had a quick rinse (little did I know that I hence will not shower for two nights.) Then there was our high elements segment which was delayed due to our late arrival with the rain. We had rock climbing and there was this 3m step up challenge where every grid you climb over entitles you to 10 points so if you climb to the top, you earn a 120 pts: 3m will give a stationary pack to needy children for every 1000 pts earned. Thought it was pretty meaningful :) i thought the wall looked normal but when it was my turn.... hahahaahaha. Basically, I climbed about 3 grids up and started shouting to my belayer I want to jump down cos I can't carry on and wanted to check out rocks to plan my way. Then Jiayi was like "huh you serious ah? giving up already?" and she told me that people downstairs will tell me where to go. And so began a lot of shouting from the people below telling me which limb to go where, guiding me up the rock wall. At times a rock would look pretty absurd to reach but I would take that leap of faith and hoist myself up with the minimal arm muscles I have and actually reach up, and my watch mates would cheer for me :D I was really heartened and it pushed me on. 3/4 up I was really drained and there seemed to be nowhere to go. I met Jerilynn so I was like "lol don't you feel like dying" and she was like "gee, thanks xy" HAHAHA. And my watch mates continued all the shouting and you know what, touching the top of the wall was the absolute best feeling in the world. Didn't notice all the sweat I have until I came down haha.
Dinner that night was a fresh meal with all-you-can-eat-rice, soup and cordial so it was great ^^ we had our sea expedition planning afterwards and we had to choose leaders to navigate and sweep all 4 watches travelling around the perimeter (about 3/4) of the island. It came to our knowledge that we only traveled 1km today but we are travelling 14km the next D: After that we were led to a super dark clearing to pitch our tents and it had a path which led deep into the forest, with our torchlights around it really felt like slenderman HAHA. Pitched our stuff and got ready to sleep, and someone pointed out this huge pond beside our tents and started saying its "giant mosquito breeding area" nope, things aren't turning our great :( and when the four of us got into our tents, we realised we pitched it onto 3 huge rocks. FAIL. So Yanlin slept in between two of it since she claims she does't move much in her sleep and the other one was somewhere near my foot. Guess we had to make do with what we have since we need all the energy we can have tomorrow.
DAY 3: Kayaking expedition! Woke up real early to load the safety boat and ate breakfast. It was Kenisha's bday as well, so we sang her a song in the cafeteria and all the 3F watches started joining in ^^ Soon we had to refill our 4l stash of water and begin our expedition. We kayaked out and seeing our surroundings: big ships and harbour, dark blue waters all around, faint hints of sun rise.. wow. It was quite steady at first, I must say things only started to get tough when it was nearing lunchtime. The sun was getting really scorching and I wanted to pee badly, so the leaders were asking for replacements for Mich, who was kayaking a sick friend (don't wish to reveal who.) all by herself. So we waited out for her and I told her she could rest a little and change with me but actually *confession* I took the chance to pee while we changed kayaks. HAHA. Got into her Kayak and paddled, and it was really tough because I had to put in all the effort I can and energy was running low from Breakfast. Basically, I slogged it all out and at that moment, I felt like dying, really. Next time, don't judge the last kayak in your diamond formation, because you don't know what's the situation like. Worse still, that friend had to continue work even though she was seasick. Anyway, Justin the other leader spotted us and kayaked up to us asking if we need a replacement. So Justin and I changed kayaks and to his horror, he spotted this half eaten blueberry cake (which I didn't notice at all) that was left on my seat LOL, and was all like "this is so.. ugh." So it was G (his partner and again, a name I felt I should not reveal.) and I kayaking and because I was very drained out, I could barely paddle and I was like paddling with a lot of rests in between. G repeatedly told me to jiayou and stuff so I was really glad to have her. :)) Finally we saw the instructor's speedboat getting in front and I was largely relieved because that means we are gathering and it'd most likely be for lunch!
Grabbed a peanut butter bread and made myself pocari sweat to kick off the next leg of our journey. With food I felt energized again so I could paddle easily XD However G felt unwell at this point and I was quite worried for her :/ Anyway, it was tough like heck because the tides were against us and for every 1m we moved, we were basically pushed back by 0.8m. According to the instructors we were actually stuck near a certain landmark for nearly an hour because we couldn't overcome the tides. Crazy how all of us didn't notice and were all paddling away. At around 2.30pm we were gathered again and this time, we were at the edge of the north and heading into the east of Ubin, into Chek Jawa. And this was what most people would agree on as the
breaking point of the whole journey. Basically, the water was treacherous, waves were huge, tides were strong. In the middle of harsh waves, hot sun and being the last kayak, I really feared that I may not get our kayak out of this horrible condition for G to get some help from the instructors. I knew she was trying very hard despite her physical conditions, and for that, I was very heartened. But I really felt very alone at that moment when it was just the two of us behind everyone else in the harsh waters. So I didn't know why, maybe it was determination, maybe it was encouragements from G, but I was driven to paddle super hard for this leg. I had no idea where the sudden burst of energy came from, but I was just paddling on and on. I sang "do you hear the people sing?" to distract myself (haha random much.) Actually pretty much wanted to burst into tears and cry from how miserable I felt and was blinking away rapidly, or maybe because a lot of sea water splashed into my eyes from the paddling. Honestly, just wanted to get out of there as soon as possible.
Then we heard the instructors calling out to us from their speedboat, it seemed that they sensed something was wrong on our kayak. Continued paddling and they suddenly caught up beside us, and they told us to hold onto the side of their boat. Not the ropes, the side. My hands were really sore and I was tired as well, so I tried but I easily lost hold of the grip because the speed boat zoomed away in a flash. Now seriously, the idea of letting me grip onto the side of the boat and pull along the whole kayak was retarded. Sigh. So I picked up my paddle and continued paddling.
I could do this, I thought. Anyway, kayaked a little more and eventually, the instructors did pull up their speedboats beside us again, this time two instructors leaned over and held on to the front and back of the kayak, opps. They told us that we can rest for a little bit as they all going to give us a little boost. Turned around and saw G lying face down and felt really really bad for her. :/ So rested for a little bit as we got the help but when we were released (past chek jawa) we were still the last kayak LOL, so no hate comments about how we got "special help" please. We did not cheat. Continued paddling, Jiayi came and checked up on us, and at this moment G felt slightly better as well so we regained composure and was no longer the last kayak :) At this point about 1/4 of the journey was left and a frenzy of things happened: someone capsized, my friend from earlier was terribly sick yet again, I had to raft up with Alessia and Kumyin because I needed to pee (rather embarrassing I must add HAHAHA.) and finally, like a glimmer of hope, we saw the landmark which would signify that we are near our campsite. Traveled progressively nearer, had more landmarks to look forward to, and it kind of started to drizzle when we were that 10m to our camp site. Just slight, cos it stopped soon. When we finally saw OBS tents at the shore and we were asked to stop, the joy makes your heart swell and the relief felt was tremendous. Kayaked up to the shore and my legs felt numb when I stood up for the first time in
9 hours. Took out our belongings but it wasn't enough, still had to drain out water from our kayaks and line them up. You are tired, your hands are sore, your legs feel numb: but what can you do? Everyone else is feeling the same and yet they're still doing it, helping one another. It was really scary again because I saw another friend (again, no names.) stand by our belongings and she started to sway a little before she fainted and hit the ground with a thud. Just, really hoped my friends will all end up fine.
We reached at 5.30pm and sunset is at 6.30. There was no light there except for torchlight and moonlight, so basically, we have to pitch our tents and cook within the next hour. There was no loose ground soil to drive the pegs in so we had to use rocks which was a bad idea. We had to make a meal by ourselves and it wasn't really pleasant trying to make instant noodles for all of us: Firstly not all of us had utensils, it was dark, and it was raining. When we wanted to empty our mess tins of food, we realised our plastic bag had a hole but all the food bits already spilled all over the grass and my shoes. Heck about our shoes: ants would start coming for the food and we are upsetting the ecosystem there. We had to wash our equipments by the sea: rinse them mess tins with seawater, grab a handful of gravel to scrub them, wash them out and keep them in our bags when it was reeking of sardines. There were no toilets either. Basically, we were physically rugged, mentally drained, dirty, wet, cold: I felt I was so, so miserable. If I came staright after my CTs, I would hve cried. Really. Something else also happened simultaneously along with all these events which just added on to my miserable points. (it's private, and if you're close enough to me irl, we may talk about it.) Went into the tent to have a powder bath, which was cleaning of areas more prone to dirt and sweat with wet tissues, then applying powder to all these areas where skin can fold together. Also, finally had a change of dry (ok not totally) clothes and I felt contented. Met Jiayi and heard that we had to do sanctuary duty, which was each watch walking up at different times and doing patrolling for 15 mins among our watch. We had the 12mn to 1am slot. So basically we finally had a chance to sleep after the most tiring and mentally draining day ever, fell asleep almost immediately. The boys woked us up at 12.15am and we walked around in ponchos trying to scare away bears, outsiders and check for our safety boat. When slipping on my poncho I accidentally knocked away my specs and had a great moment of panic as I couldn't find them, and when Yanlin finally found it it was squashed and the shape changed. ( +misery points.) Woke up the next tent and slept again, and by 5am, I realised that my feet could feel water. Had a huge shock and I woke up and realised that the edges of our tent was all water. Imagine my bigger shock when I realised that the tent was leaning on one side due to the placement of our bags, hence the not so waterproof sides were exposed. Yanlin and Deniece woke up by then and it was like me pushing up the apex of the tent while they placed the bags differently. But the tent was still tilted. Then it started to leak, like through the torchlight I could see water spraying through, and I realised that our flysheet was incorrectly placed. So basically, I went and stood outside in the rain trying to readjust the fly sheet and it was wet and sticking onto a tent, being a bitch and not doing it's job of keeping us waterproofed but I can't do anything about it because the rocks can't secure them. Basically, I went back in and we want to sleep but water is flowing onto the dry areas, we were cold, and plus all the past events... (++misery points.)
Anyway we decided to make the best out of it so we decided to start talking about the most random things on planet earth. It was super epic and funny because we initially were saying that we're sorry Kenisha had to spend her birthday like this then it became who was the oldest or something and what do we do in our CCAS, which led to Kenisha and Deniece talking about how their concert is just a day after OBS, and it goes on. Somewhere along the line the convo became PG because we started talking about pads HAHAHA (ok won't say no more.) and we were having a good time laughing about shit when we realised that the guy's tent was right beside ours.... So we were like "what if they heard us??! aiya LOL". Also, we started to hear laughter and screams from the guys' tent and after trying to eveasdrop, we heard that apparently, a crab got into their tent and they were trying to chase it out WHAT HAHA. And at that moment, I realised that no matter how tough a situation might be or how dejected you feel: there will be people who will pull you through with their support, and I was so thankful for these watch-mates for talking about everything in that few hours when we were slowly getting drenched. Obviously, no one got out at the supposed meeting time and we talked through sunrise. Thankfully, Deniece was a food IC and we had some group food with us like bread and PB. Being nice people and seeing that it was only drizzling, we decided to go out and feed our watchmates HAHAHA epic max. By 8.30am some people came out to roam around and there was a mini 3F gathering so Kum Yin and isabella was complaining and talking to me about stuff :) Everyone's tent was drenched basically. Went to change in the tent and while I was doing so, yx and Shanice started to sing Mundi and I was laughing like crap so they changed all the lyrics into "xinyan xinyan" HAHAHA. Packed (which was quite a bitch because WET) and stocked up water before we finally proceeded on with land expedition.
I realised we have already headed into
DAY 4: so yeah, I was right, the bags are a burden when you have to trek. We actually went into a dead end in just 2mins after we set off apparently we turned too early. Thankfully, the first check point was only 1.2km away and we were allowed to deposit out bag at the summit of the small hill we had to hike up :) Walked the remaining distance to the peak and wow. It was a bird's eye view of the Quarry and the water was a beautiful turqoise, and to our left it was Singapore and to our right it was Malaysia. So we wrote reflections and afterwards Jiayi told us we actually can hear echos if we shout to the Quarry loud enough, and we can shout whatever was on our minds. Many people were like "I miss my bed!" "Wanna go home!" and I even heard "POTATO CHIPS!!" haha. Obviously we couldn't hear anything so we started to shout cheng ho together. Heard a faint echo after our like, 5th attempt? haha! Went down, and had to proceed to the next destination. It was a long trek and the weight on my shoulders was unbearable, but I was glad people kept encouraging me to go on and Kenisha offered to strap up my waist stip, which made me feel much comfortable afterwards! Our next checkpoint was a really meaningful one, which involves us visiting one of the residents of Pulau Ubin. I will not share much, because I realised this post is FREAKING LONG and anyway, there are a lot of takeaways and inspirations I wanna write if I ever do so. If you're going to OBS or have already went there, chances are you would see this wonderful, wonderful old lady as well.
Since we were delayed by wet weather, it was 4.30pm after that task and I think due to safety reasons, we wouldn't complete the final checkpoint and we were told to go back to camp 2 immediately. Quite sad that we technically did not complete our land ex :( but when we saw the gates of camp 2, the joy and happiness was just *_* Getting 'home' never felt so blissful. When we got a chance to put down our bags all of us were rejoicing and just being extremely happy that we survived sea and land ex. We had a celebratory dinner that night so some people went to get our cooking utensils (and wash the yuck sea water mess tins) while the rest drained and washed the tents. It was a lot of silent working as we rinsed all the dirt off and carried stuff to the clearing. Heng ah, didn't need to climp the 101 steps again. To our horror, one of our ground sheets were gone, so one of the tents had to use the blue tard (the ground sheet for dinners). Dinner was awesome as the four watches who did our land and sea ex together were given fresh food, canned food and rice and we must craft a main course, appetizer, salad and desert. Since there were eggs I think every group came up with fried rice HAHAHA and for us, we made fruit salad, chawanmushi and a desert who consited of mashing up all of our biscuits and cakes from our happy food HAHA. The desert group even took out the white filling from oreos and mashed them into the words "cheng ho". The fruit group realised that they had too many food and they spent half their time eating HAHAHA. Unfortunately fire wasn't that strong and I almost thought the Chawanmushi might not cook in time :( But it did. Junde's fried rice was imba! When it was time to present it was bloody funny because all the 3F elit people came out and started to use glamorization everywhere like every food detail also got meaning de HAHAHA. Had a great dinner, and finally had a good shower after 2 days of not really washing off sea water. Apparently our tent was still wet from the rinse so we tried wiping with toilet paper but used all, with towel but to no avail, and finally we scattered Prickly heat all over the ground hoping to dry it up, but no. It did became reasonably dry to sleep on, but the minty sensation chilled us to our bones.
DAY 5: Last and final day. A lot of cleaning up to do, and we had to dry so much shit and hang them back into our store room. Everyone knew out tent as the "prickly heat tent" HAHAHA and in the end Wenqiang poured water in it and I sacrificed my towel for him to wipe the floor. Sigh, my dunman high towel. Had the camp tee and final gathering in our circle, which Jiayi led a really meaningful discussion about our lives and the people around us who had been the belayer of our lives and shaped us to be who we are. It started to get pretty much emotional and many people included myself teared/cried and my heart broke when I heard Junde cry sia. It's like you can really feel what he's feeling then. Jiayi wrapped up saying that there was "more tears than expected" HAHA and we had to pay up 20 bucks for our lost ground sheet. :/ Received back our valuables and Jiayi made us promise to not open them until we left Ubin. (turns out only our group had that cos everyone around us used the phones but hey, I wouldn't wanna go back to reality so quickly yet. As we sat with our bags waiting for our ferry, I felt sad. The experiences might have been quite horrible but a little bit of me would want to go through obs again. It was not as bad as I thought after all. Took a final group photo at Punggol before we left to go home, and I have never been so glad to be home, really home as well ^-^ Threw all my bagged wet clothes which stinks into the laundry and had a good shower.
Well, OBS may make you feel horrible but it is indeed the most impactful camp I had ever been to. "If it is not tough, it is not an OBS course." " There will definitely be one point when you will feel like giving up in this camp." were some words I've heard about OBS, and how very true they were. In that week I was pushed to my limits in that outdoor classroom and I had learnt so much about physical endurance and mental toughness than I had in the past 15 years of my life.
I knew I was back to reality when I received 23 unread emails. S i g h.
