It was Auschwitz with better food, although most days the food sucked, at least there was food.
The first thing that caught my sight as the taxi I was in turned it’s way into Pasir Ris bus terminal was the long line of waiting of buses. They were not the typical green army buses, or army lorries, but rather, plain civilian style buses. As I, with my parents, joined in the group of enlistees being herded up into them, a vivid scene of prisoners of war boarding one of those windowless trains, being sent away into a faraway concentration camp came into my mind.
It had started raining by the time buses pulled departed for the ferry terminal, as if the heavens were sympathizing with me. The buses led us to a ferry terminal where a fifteen minute boat ride took us to a remote island where the camp was located.
It is worth noting that almost everything in the army is outsourced to external contractors, from the buses that drove us to the ferry terminal, the ferries that carried us to Pulau Tekong (where the camp is situated), the food served, the laundromat that cleans the bedsheets to the gear we were given. It’s our very own brand of a military-industrial complex.
Up to this point, everything had been civil. However, once my parents are I were separated, the atmosphere changed quickly from what could have been mistaken as a leisure ride to a resort to that of a regimented military.
The hours that followed were boring. Gear was handed out, checked, and rechecked. Lots of paperwork had to be done and it was nightfall by the time we received our haircut and had time off to ourselves, which wasn’t much at all. I didn’t even have time for a shower. The first day came to a conclusion. There was gradually more free time as the days came by, but the hours that they came at totally sucked for me, as they fell during when the people I would want to contact were asleep.
The army feels very much like an Orwellian society. We’re constantly reminded about how much the army cares for each and every of us, and are here to help us. Realistically, we’re nothing more than numbers in the system.
Twice a day, during flag raising and lowering, we’re expected to suspend all activities for the duration and face, in attention, at the direction of the flag. This reminds me of the scene in the movie, Dark City, where all activities come to a halt as the city’s inhabitants fall unconscious while the city is being reshaped in a process called “tuning”.
On the third day, we had our weapons presentation ceremony. This was preceded by a mock fire drill, which had us fall in not knowing what to expect next. From there, we marched off in darkness to the stadium ground, which was illuminated only by two camp fires, each burning from three tin cans. A short speech was given by the commanding officer of our company, and each of our names were called our and handed a rifle, the SAR-21, during which, the theme song from Star Wars (opening sequence) was played, which I felt was completely inappropiate. Instead of taking up arms in defense, it made me feel as if I were part of a big bad empire that was going to come crushing down on some small fellows. They might as well go all out and play the Imperial March instead.
In addition to being an Orwellian society, the army is also the prime example of a bureaucracy. When I finally gave in to my throat which was waging a war of insurgency against me and requested to see a Medical Officier (i.e. doctor), I felt a lot like the Land Surveyor in Franz Kafka’s book, “The Castle“, getting pushed from one place to another without getting anything accomplished. It took me three days of getting pushed around before I got what I wanted. It really is a process that would even daunt Kafka himself.
More similarities to that of a concentration camp, bunk inspections started taking up pace towards the end of the second week. We had as much as three inspections on a really bad day. It seem to very much like how guards in concentration camps would constantly ransack bunks for contraband and other concealed items that might aid in escape.
Army life is extremely routine. I wake up at the same time everyday, go through the sequence of events, and sleep, or at least try to (for I commonly have difficulty sleeping), on the clock.
If I had to single out one thing that I dislike in the army, it would be foot drills. Foot drills are a relic of old when armies marched towards in line and faced each other off in formation on the battlefield, which we no longer do today as everyone understands the pure stupidity of that due to the invention of the machine gun. It’s one of those things preserved for the sake of tradition, which looks good on the parade square but serves no other purpose.
Personally, I’m having a hard time time trying to integrate with people. I don’t share the same level of enthusiasm as most of the people, and it’s hard for me to do something which I do not believe in, and this extends even to singing the army songs – I’ve to force myself to utter out the words and sang them, although I felt none of that excitement or euphoria or fighting spirit as the army loves to call it, no matter how hard I tried. I felt very much like Bernard Marx did during the communal singing session in the book, Brave New World. I’m of a personality that is on the opposite end of the spectrum compared to the rest, and also I’m far back in my physical abilities, among many others. Often I feel as if I’m persona non grata in my platoon. And sometimes, I feel like Leonard Lawrence (better known as Pvt. Gomer Pyle) in the movie, Full Metal Jacket.
I realize that I’m drawing a lot of analogies to other characters in fiction/non-fiction. This is due to my inability to express precisely how I feel in words, and I hope I could be pardoned for that.
Well, that was sixteen days compressed into one entry. A lot of content has been left out as I felt that I shouldn’t bore my readers with more of the mundane details. I do keep a diary and wrote a few short stories during what free time I have, for writing is the only thing that keeps me sane. If my fellow readers would prefer, I could post an entry for almost everyday.
I book back in on the evening of the 1st of October. Until then, time to catch up life, and thank you to the people that communicated with me while I was in camp. I was ill-prepared and ran into a whole bunch of issues such as running out of battery on my mobile phone and my Gmail app not functioning correctly, but I’ll step up communications in future I promise (getting more batteries later today). My overfilled RSS Reader is calling, in no small part thanks to Stargrace and Tipa, who both have managed to write over 30 articles during the 16 days I was gone for, and RailGun too, with 13 articles. Time to sift through them.
