I am back in camp doing my ICT. After a break of a few years, I thought they’d forgotten about me. Just like after my ORD, they forgot about me for many years. Sometimes it is really nice to be forgotten.
Every time I go back for ICT, I try to think of the positive things to psyche myself to be happy with going back. Time passes faster when you’re happy.
But every time, once I put on the dreaded green uniform… I recall why I hate NS. The uniform is so uncomfortable. Just 10 – 15 minutes in it, even while indoors, I start to feel hot and sweaty. Aircon is a necessary accessory to these uniforms.
Then, when I reach camp, I realize that time has suddenly come to a stand-still. It is then I recall again, why, NS is so frustrating. Okay, I must admit that the break from the usual hustle and bustle in our civilian lives is quite welcome by many people, myself included. So maybe a one week ICT is fine. Or a 2 day refresher course. It is a good time to catch up with old friends. But, no, not for 3 weeks. I will die if I have to figure out every day how to spend 3 hours on a coffee break at a canteen 3 minutes walk away.
Catch up with old friends? Yeah, that is if you have old friends. What if you are the “extras” that get tossed around time and again depending on where manpower is needed? So that every ICT you are working with different people? And those different people have all been together for over a decade, and you’re just an “outsider” trying to fit in?
But I should count my blessings. Most nights I can come home, so I can still catch up on other things that need to get done. How much worse if I had to spend 3 weeks in Timbuktu. The world doesn’t stop for ICT yah.
I think blogging is great. It gives me a chance to rant my complaints away. (Yah, my last ICT was before blogging… haha.)