Survivor: Pulau Ubin

If any of you have ever found life a constant struggle against the infinite tides of inadequate biscuit rations, nagging mums that force-feed you at dinner time like you're an anorexic pygmy, and constant shoulderaches stemming from the 1.5 kilograms worth of books crammed into your bag, then look no further than Outward Bound Singapore for training because the nonsense you're forced to undergo there makes all of the above look as easy as a Maths paper Ryan can pass.

Little OBS advert aside, today's post will be entirely devoted to complaining and ranting on and on and on about the shit I experienced in OBS. It took me one entire day before i decided to get down to my computer and type this blog entry out because of two things:

1. I was too busy nursing mosquito bites, angry abrasions, and a hungry stomach

2. The wires at home short-circuited when I drooled over them in my delirious glee at seeing signs of technology that extended beyond electric lights and fans.

So maybe the second reason was a bit far fetched. The truth was, I was too busy doing other things like surfing the net and playing some computer games to remember what my blog URL actually was. But the part about being happy at seeing technology was pretty much true, because you see, in OBS, all the good stuff like an air-conditioner is reserved for the instructors, who are given the good life mainly because we pay them $300. We, on the other hand, lose $300 just to pitch tents that hopefully shelter us from the elements (which incidentally include rain, muddy ground, and angry sandflies raring for a go at our tender flesh), cook our own rice (that looks and tastes like either semi-crushed pebbles or soggy chunks of mud), and hike for 3 hours down a road infested with mud and puddles of grimy dog urine with a backpack weighing twice as much as a baritone sax (if you play one, you'll sympathise with my miserable plight).

And that's to say the least, because what I and the rest of my watch pals went through was pie (banana flavoured; banana pies are good). And it was thanks in part to the rain that served to annihilate our shoes and tear them ragged beyond recognition. So here's the story:

Raleigh (some Queen's pet whose name OBS adopted for our watch/group) was due to set off for some unknown section of Ubin in the middle of nowhere by kayak (when we could have just as easily taken a speedboat) with the ultimate goal of suffering as much as possible admist wildboar and snake infested swamps. It was hence lucky, though when a thunderstorm broke out as suddenly as a fart after a meal of beans can strike you.

So here I have to digress from the subject topic just a bit to explain this seemingly horrible stroke of luck. To the average layman who has as yet failed to attend OBS (lucky shits), one might think kayaking in a thunderstorm is feasible and an extremely excting thing to do at that. They fail to comprehend, however, the terror of mini tsunamis capsizing your boat then flushing you into the depths of Singapore waters, where baby sharks and stingrays prowl, ready to take a chunk out of you as and when they feel like it. They also miss the fact that a stray thunderbolt might think you a likeably attractive lightning rod and strike you, charring the sunburnt skin and cooking you alive. Ah well, you might make a small meal for those who survive. Better than the rations they give you in any case.

The OBS instructors managed to grasp this fact well enough, and so we stayed on dry land for one more day, pushing the day's activitites to next morning, when we would kayak in the early morning before the sun scorches your pants off and cooks you to a crisp. Plus, because of this postponement, we skipped the entire shitty campsite and moved straight to Camp 1, which was newly constructed and looked more like a resort to the average OBS goer who's been living off nasty uncooked bullcrap for the past 3 days. Oh, and yes, it had cooked food.

So maybe we were the lucky ones to go for the "easy schedule" and not have to do the really hardcore stuff. And you might say we're lucky farts, and that there was nothing wrong with a "change of environment", making you learn more about the world around youl. Easier said then done, baby. Idealist freaks that come up with thoughts and reasons like these and who work on wishy washy theories of goodwill and learning the principles and ropes of life should go for an OBS course. 3 days will be sufficient to make them go boil their heads for a proper dinner.

I mean, come on, even with a slightly slacker schedule, we don't change the fact that we still had to undergo infinitely tiring tasks and survive under conditions deemed absolutely unsuitable for the average Singaporean kid who's lived in luxury for his whole damn life. And if they're trying to make us appreciate life more then they're wrong, cos' we'd probably go back, eat all our food for a few days, sleep and lament about how we should've saved or end up with lives that resemble our time at OBS, then forget all about it for the rest of our lives. Goddamnit the camp was a bloody waste of $300 good dollars that could be spent on a month of decent meals.

But then again, I'm writing this in the direct aftermath of my fiery anguish at being forced through OBS. Truly Singaporean people are pessimistic bitches who complain about anything they see, and ignore the good stuff. This account might be wholly unreliable, and just another lame account of how OBS was a waste of money. There certainly were fun times, like laughing with my friends, laughing at my friends... and... er... just general friendly humour. For all I know, you might be heading off for OBS and returning telling me the exact opposite of what I've just written here. You might find OBS the "enrichingly challenging" experience it claims to be.

Oh dammit, who'm I kidding.

Back From China -- Now for Ubin

Ten long days admist the freezing sleet and snow of Northeastern China, an array of fiery Chinese salesmen (nothing against them, of course -- they just drive a hell of a bargain), a dumpling feast involving a particularly bitchy and furious Chinese lady and a wide variety of tour guides boasting a wide variety of credentials but never really living up to them.

That little snippet above most aptly captures the essential gist of what happened during my vacation in Northeastern China, which for absolute nutheads at geography like myself lies just a few miles away from Russia. This means 2 things -- that firstly we'd be seeing plenty of Russian Sharapova wannabes, and that secondly (perhaps more significantly as well), the icy winds and barrages of snowy, er, snow that the largest country in the world boasts sort of spilt over into that particular section of the Rising Dragon. Cue four layers worth of clothing for the upper torso and 3 layers for my lower body. And surprise, surprise, despite all that hassle in donning jacket after jacket, sweater after sweater, it was still cold.

To adequately decribe, express the incessant shivering, the frosty gusts of winter wind creeping up any holes in your armoury of wool and cotton, permeating the so-called impregnable walls of your $90 jacket... would to say the least be impossible for even Shakespeare to accomplish. However, I'll attempt what I can in this respect, and tell you how you can begin to understand how I felt there without having to travel to China.

Firstly, empty your freezer of all items, necessary or unnecessary. Then, splosh icy cold water all over your body. Then strip nude and stuff yourself in the freezer. Close the door. Stay in there for a few hours, then come out. Rinse and repeat

Done that yet? Yea. The final two steps were meant to simulate moment of pure solace I found in exiting the freezer after spending time outside viewing absolutely pointless ice sculptures. And as your body begins to adapt to the warmth of the tour bus's heater, absorb the heat that surrounds you, the bloody driver drives so quickly that he reaches the next stop, and we get off only to see more pointless pieces of art that were bound to melt by March in any case.

So now I'm done complaining, I think you guys might wanna hear more about the marvels of Chinese cultures. Well too bad, you've come to the wrong place, because I don't like to think of my blog as an encyclopedia. You can get those off Wikipedia or something to that extent. Instead, I'll waste more space on my blog posting more violent ranting on a particularly bad tour guide we met in China

The first thing that struck me about this joke of a guide was his funny knack for laughing at his own jokes. At first I thought he was just a humourous guy whom I might be able to get along with, but then the intensity and frequency of his laughter kept increasing, it just became annoying. And I would've forgiven him, if his jokes were even good. Sorry to disappoint, but they weren't. And I won't even bother giving an example because they probably weren't jokes in the first place. In my opinion, the old coot was just another miserable bachelor forced into falling in love with himself because no one else would do the same.

So anyway, it wasn't just his laughing that put me off -- it was his sheer arrogance. He started with his self- intro by telling us not his name, but his old job -- an english teacher. He then went off on a long rant about how good his english was and how he loved the english language and how well the foreigners he'd led on tours could understand him. WTF.

And I might have accepted that piece of boasting if he could actually speak coherent English. Too bad, the deluded old freak couldn't!. His first bit of English was attempting to explain how Japanese aggressors attacked and stuff. The dialogue went something like this:

Na me, gong da wo men de ren jiu shi ri ben jun, aggresors, ah, you know aggressors? Xian zai jiu qu can guan yi xi zhe xie aggressors. Eh, wo men jiu getting out of the bus, ah xiao xin ni men fall into the ground. Floor is srippey, ah very fallable, and stimulating.

LOLs.

So we were forced to endure his English and his boasting about how good he was at it. Bullcrap of a guide if there ever was one.

I've run out of juice to write anymore. Have to go pack for my OBS trip tommorow, and hoping I can find a backpack large enough to store my stuff. Hoping I can wake up in time as well -- I've lacked practice, having woken up at 9 for the past few weeks. Ah well.