I finished reading the first of the assigned books from Stanford today.

I have always had a strange fascination with war retold from the civilians' point of view; in Sec 2 we read war poetry written by soldiers at the frontline, but never (at least not that I can recall) any from civilians. How can I describe this recount, then- to me, it seemed detached and strangely unemotional - in military war poetry you get vivid descriptions of the warfront and an overwhelming sense of helplessness and waiting for death; in this book at least there was too a sense of helplessness but a different sort- the kind where you are just what they call collateral damage, and there is nothing you can do except to live each day as it is handed to you.

It's like that when my grandmother speaks, on rare occasions, about life under the Japanese Occupation- we learnt about Sook Ching and the kempeitai, about guerilla fighting and Force 136, but all my grandmother says about the Occupation is how the Japanese soldiers gave her cigarettes and taught her how to smoke. There's a difference between military and civilian accounts of war, and is either more horrific? I find the scenes in military descriptions more physically terrifying, but civilian accounts have this disarming tendency to worm their way into your thoughts with their overwhelming normality.

And as all war memoirs do, it made me feel so thankful for everything I have. I opened the cabinet and spent 5 minutes trying to decide which tasty snack I should munch on before dinner (the perils of shopping with the mother: she literally buys anything that I think looks tasty, and we have, inter alia, cheddar cheese Ruffles and Chachos and Waffle Crisp and Calbee prawn crackers) and chose Waffle Crisp to nibble at as I read about a woman who went crazy from the death of her daughters and shoved a bowl of earthworms into the author's mother's hands, telling her it was a magical food she'd discovered.

The author wrote about being trained as a child solider, learning how to use a rifle at age 7, and still so short such that the rifle would bang against her calves when she slung it over her shoulder. I have seen Wei Jie with his rifle before- thankfully he is taller and can hold the rifle properly, but sometimes his commanders don't let him shoot, especially when he's in one of his pre-coffee-not-awake moods because they're scared he'll do a negligent discharge and end up in DB. I am grateful that he is learning how to use a rifle, and how to strip a machine gun in 16s, so that girls and children like me do not have to. I am also grateful that he has the luxury of being "pulled out" from some shooting trainings, because the worst that could happen is DB, and not death in some ditch somewhere.

And that, for the moment, are a few of the thoughts that I have been able to crystallize after reading the book. If anyone else wants to borrow the book (and be part of an awesome Stanford experience), drop me a line! I'll lend it out until I need it back for school. Heh.

Went for dinner at Sakuraya Fish Mart with Yuhui today, and while waiting for him to come over from camp (in Sungei freaking Gedong; where's that, I hear you say, and I reply, EXACTLY) I walked around Parkway Parade for 2 hours. It was quite a good thing though because it emptied up belly space for the huge mound of fish we promptly started nomming. Sakuraya has decent (IMO at least, and supported by Yuhui, but neither of us are very picky when it comes to food) and cheap fresh fish, and we went a little crazy picking up plates of fish.

Yuhui: "I don't know why everytime I go out with you we always end up over ordering. Only with you."

And indeed we overordered- we left 1 piece of salmon belly, 2 pieces of maguro, and 2 pieces of amaebi behind. He was smart enough to have ordered hot udon, which offset the coldness of the fish a bit, while I stupidly ordered cold rice and ended up really full after about... 5 pieces of fish. I am a failure. But we swopped and it got marginally better for awhile before I ended up really stuffed. We had to go for hot tea later to cook some of the fishies in our bellies.

The best part? Because of our epic auntie skills ("shall we get salmon?" "yes but let's get that piece cos its cheaper", ad infinitum) it only cost us $64.20. For so much fish we couldn't even finish it. We both left very full and very happy.

And we had a great time talking about life and all sorts of random shit- I have missed doing judgement-worthy nonsense with him! He is super buff now, but he hasn't changed a bit because in the bus to Paya Lebar MRT, he was still as fidgety as always. Except because he's buff, he fidgets in different ways and almost started doing pull-ups in the bus (I kid you not) until I had to tell him to cease and desist lest we get evicted from the bus.

And we took Polaroid photos, which Rey aptly said, thanks to my Disney princess films, "my princess friend". He was none too pleased about that, and said he would regret it when he was old and wrinkly, but we were in a sashimi-induced hangover and also betting who would get diarrhea first so he didn't really pursue the matter further. But aww my princess friend :,) no matter how buff he gets there'll always be a little bit of that fairy princess inside him, eh?

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On a sidenote, my childhood friend decided to sign on as a navy officer!!! I am so excited and proud of him. My little baby boy has grown up and is serving the nation :,) I was so excited that I flapped around in fangirly joy and thanked him for serving the nation, which according to SAF confessions is like The Line that all NSmen want to hear.

They lie.

He just said "lol welcome" and life went on as per normal. -.-

Me: Jie, today I parked a car!

Wei Jie: And did that incident end with a bang? Or a loud thud?

Yeah this is how much confidence he has in my driving. Silly boy just asking to be run over.

For the record I'm not too bad! Managed to park perfectly straight by reversing only once (i.e. without having to go out and then back into the lot again) after today's lesson and I accumulated 4 STAMPS yay me!!!

So yesterday was the Guards graduation ceremony, and even though the invitation was for 2 people only, Jie's parents were very nice and managed to sneak me in!

In true army fashion, we were told to be seated by 6:30, so I arranged to meet his parents at 6:15. Turns out the parade was scheduled to start at 7:15. Bedok Camp is really huge though; the walk from the carpark to the parade square was super long but they had random cardboard soldiers standing around to show the way.

I got stopped at the gate to the parade square because I didn't have a letter, and I didn't know which company Jie was in (I didn't even know they still had companies!). But the sergeant asked me who I was here for, and I told him so, and in a flash of recognition he was like "OH, HIM! He's in Bravo coy go sit in the middle." I later realised that he was a minor celebrity in camp because his parents wrote a complaint letter awhile back, and the CO called his dad and they had a nice chat after that. When we were sitting around and bored while waiting for the parade to start, we were joking about it and his dad considered sending the CO a cake.

So we sat around for an hour waiting for the parade to start, and the whole time they played the SAME song on loop as background music. I am not even kidding. 1 song on loop the whole time. I got so fidgety that when the speeches finally started I was trying to pick out all the amusing parts (and trust me, when you are bored EVERYTHING is amusing) and tweeting them. For instance, "Guards are trained to be proficient in the 2 guardsmen operations of helirappelling, fast march, and coastal swim." and also, "This parade compromises the 3 companies of 1 Guards."

Camo cream is scary stuff! With the paint on he doesn't really look much like a face at all... and even when he's smiling you can't see it because there are no lips to frame the teeth and it's like he's just baring his teeth. And it's super hard to clean off haha even after when he joined us for dinner he was still a little green. It's quite amusing that some people don't camo their ears though, so it's super obvious. Guys, if you're reading this, remember to cover up them ears in a war okay!

Jie's beret still looks mushroomy, but it's pretty cool and his dad got to pin on some nice guards pin for him. They also tossed the beret, and I've never gotten how you keep track of which one is yours. His dad told him to throw higher and switch it for a nicer more seasoned one HAHA.

After that, we had to wait for them to send arms and then clean up etc. There were half naked guys streaking all around the corridors of the barracks haha. By the time we had dinner it was already 9pm lol.

Anyway, super proud of Jie haha. One of his sergeants turned out to be his brother's friend, so he came over to talk to Jie's parents. (lol again Jie was a minor celebrity) According to him the entire guards course is pretty shitty and shag, and his having pulled through is something we should all be proud of. :D

Went to the Travelers' Clinic at TTSH today for my TB test/vaccinations for Stanford. Argh, Stanford, the pain I go through for you.

There is just something about hospitals and other medical facilities that makes my brains leak out. I walked in trembling with fear and even the counter staff remarked that I looked really scared. All I could manage in response to that was a very eloquent "hehehehe." She gave me a form to fill up with my basic information, and I was stumped by "age", "IC number", and "date of last period". (Srsly, why do they even need the last one?? Who remembers this kind of shit anyway?)

The nurse whom I consulted was very kind and decided for me which injections were important and which were not, but with every vaccination she circled I squeaked. I thought my vaccination record was pretty comprehensive- my mum even brought me for an extra vaccination (chickenpox) when I was 6. Because I was already conscious then I sulked the whole day after that and she had to buy me ice cream. But as fate would have it, in the USA, you need 2 doses of chickenpox vaccine to be considered immune. -__- So I had to get that, and a booster for whooping cough, and meningitis, in addition to getting blood drawn for a TB test.

The nurse drawing blood for the TB test took one look at me and said, "You don't really exercise much, do you?" This was followed by a 15-minute search for a suitable vein, and I was told to do some emergency quick exercises like raising my fist up and down in the hopes that I would buff up in that 5 minutes or so. To her credit, she managed to find a suitable vein without using baby needles or collapsing the vein- ugh the memory of a terrible 40-minute blood drawing session in P6 still haunts me now. I was a total wimp about it though.

AND I HAD 3 JABS TO GO AFTER THAT.

Meningitis was by far the worst. It ACHED. And it is still ACHING. My entire left arm is now a useless lump of flesh. Intramuscular injections suck so bad.

And then I came home and slept for 3 hours and woke up still grouchy. Also there is a bruise where I had blood taken.

Whine whine whine whine whine.