Busy December.. and following months to come

Even since my Company know our role and task for the upcoming ATEC stage 1, we have been busy preparing for it.

A short summary of how this month is being planned.
1st week : Outfield, Company Mission
2nd week : Outfield, 'Grader' for 'sister' Company
3rd week : Standby Duty which overlaps Christmas
4th week : Low-key, clear leaves

Somehow know that my superior is not really pleased with my performance which i can understand as i think i really didn't put in much effort compared to other commanders.. Well officers have to be super motivated beings are we hold higher rank and better pay, so shall not let me emotion affect me.. Have to seek improvement and self reflect like what others always say..

Spending my X'mas in camp wasn't a bad idea. Finally able to have a really happy 'Happy Hour'. Having food catered that for the first time that stuffed us up, program that i really enjoy seeing us do. Thanks god for bestow my OC with good socializing and MC skill which really cheer us up rather than his usual sarcastic remark which i experience frequently.

Had a TBTL (team building, team learning) session among all the commanders including my OC and CSM. This is how it runs, we are to state the strength and weakness of the person on a piece of mahjong paper while the person will go into a 'isolation' room to wait. Its kind of exciting to know what people think of you especially what our OC thinks of us. This session was done on Sat, after last parade, our free time, OTOT, do whatever you want.. .. and lasted from 1800 till 2300. So.. there goes our free time, luckily the session is interesting and not do for the sake of doing kind of activity.

This standby duty was really tiring for me. Slept late for most of the days as failed to meet the 'deliveries' which my OC wanted. Everyday just waiting for 26th to come. really glad that we have the long break which lasted from 26th to 1st of Jan 2008, although i will be spending my New Year Eve in camp AGAIN!

Talking about burning festive occasion and public holidays, my birthday will be doing standby duty again for 3 days, stretching across 9th, 10th and 11th. Yes.. 3rd and 4th day of CNY.. Felt damn demoralized when i heard this arrangement as i already missed my bday last year in Taiwan.. Bday is something important to me which i didn't fail not to celebrate for my past 20 years till i enlisted. It have been even more important when i knew someone else had the same birth date as me and we had celebrate with each other for the past hmm.. i also forget liao haha!!

But the trade off for this arrangement is to let our 'sisters' Company, to take over our January's and February's standby duty which is the initial plan for the quarter. Which means from 14 days of duty we had shorten till 3days! What a deal!!! -_- yea, on my bday also

Another reason being, if we follow the initial plan, we will have less time to spend with our family member as after the standby duty in Feb, in less than a week to pack our stuff and prepare to embark into our ATEC stage 2 in Thailand which will take up another 1 month.

Baked, Toasted, Stir-fry, Grilled, Fried, BURNED!
C Cube

Parents Birthday Present: Nokia 6120 Classic

Recently got for both my parents a Nokia 6120 classic where they birthday are on Nov and Dec. Owe my mom's present for 1 month as too busy to look out for her. Till my Starhub plan going to ends, my father hurry me to get a new handset. Only then i start to look out for what phone with the following criteria: Need to have camera & radio.. Also decided not to get for them any lousy quality camera phone as my mom always like to take picture of her flower arrangement.

In the end, we got one of them using my Starhub renewal of plan while another we just get the handset from Sim Lim.. Coincidentally, we got a black and white just like the Chinese YIN and YANG and white for my mom while black for my dad.

Something that really pissed me off while buying the handset for Sim Lim, but also partially my mistake. After doing some research of the handset price online, i found out that there is this shop in AMK selling 6120 at $338 W/ GST. I decided to choose the Sim Lim shop as one of the sales person there is one of my teacher's friend and the price we got from other model are relatively cheaper. When i reached the shop, He quoted me $348, ok la $10 more i also don't wish to make another trip to AMK to get the phone also i promised my mom i will get her something that day.

While I'm busying looking at other handset for myself. He took out his calculator and added in the GST, making it $370+.. As I'm too anxious to get the phone i didn't bothered about the extra 7% GST, also forgot the AMK deal. Until i rushed back home and start to think about the difference in price then i felt that i was 'chopped'

LESSON LEARNT: Always check on the product whether GST is included as now 7% GST can be quite painful when they are added in.

Carrot Head
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Standard Chartered Marathon 2007

Woah! finally completed my first and longest race. Here are some of the moments i felt at the various marks.

Pre race

Day before: Packed my items which included my fuel belt, mp3, extra clothing and footwear for after race. Had a chemistry experiment of mixing my power gels into my bottles for fuel belt as i found out that i cant squeeze in all the 6 power gel into 1 small little pouch which i intend to put my mp3.

Here is the formula. 2 x power gel squeezed into the bottle, add in 1 tablet of Berocca (given in race kit) and add in water till it does look so thick. Risky move for me to to pull out this stunt as its often recommended not to try something new especially on food before and during races. Anyway it didn't backfire me during the run.

2 hrs before run: Check in of baggage was easy although queue was abit long. Gotten a good number for my baggage, 4646 whereas my tag number is 5252.. guess my mom after knowing these number will most probably buy for next 4D, 4652 'quan da' haha!

Start of run: Still stuck in the large crowd. imagine i was stuck for 8mins before crossing the flag off point.

During race: (refer to the map for more understanding, click here)

First 2km: Still with Wilson, after 2 water point, he is no where to be found. Must be indulge with his techno music and started running in his pace.

Marina Bay (3 km): Saw Wei Yang and gang, get to know that they are adopting a comfortable run and rest method for this race, hence overtook them after a short conversation. Told them that I'm looking for Wilson, in fact he was behind me till he caught up with WY shortly after i left. Guess it made Wilson run faster to find me, in the end he caught up in front of me without my notice.

Marina Coastal Drive (7 km): This is where its damn crowded and saw some familiar faces as it is a two-way flow. Saw boon how, Gregory, and some men from NS & Ah Lu from secondary sch.

Marina Coastal drive: While exiting Marina area, Fat Cat (sec sch senior) caught up with me and overtook me after a short while.

Back to City, towards ECP (10-18km): Still feeling good as i had been training to go 20km. Saw my OC.. haha! tried to keep quiet and siam him but in the end still kanna caught. Saw him running in a very comfortable pace, guess he is also conserving for next day outfield. Basically stopped for all the water points to hydrate and regulate my pace.

In East Coast Park (19-33km): Cramp starts to kick in once i enter ECP. Did a good stretch at the 19k mark. Can see most water booth now start to give out deep heat for us to apply, to make my race fee worth while i apply whenever i cant feel the deep heat's warming effect.

Before turning point: Saw Sunny, Jonathan and Kiat Rui, was surprise and relief to see Sunny there as i thought he had trained quite hard for this race to perform well.

Turning mark (In between 25km and 26km): Before reaching the turning point, i saw Wilson (once again), tried shouting for him but was kindly ignored as he is still indulge in his music. He was about 2km ahead of me. Saw my army friends, Leming and another officer whom both had just ORD recently and my OC just 400m away from the turning point, tried to catch up with them but too far apart after the turning point.

Power Gel station (26km): Gotten a free power gel. (Yes! minus another $2.50 from race fee haha!!!) Think they gave me a coffee or mocha flavoured power gel. After consumed it, cant wait to drink at the next water point as its flavouring is so strong and made me felt thirsty.

Exiting ECP: Saw Gregory whom i mention earlier that was very much in front of me. Caught up with him at the Coastal Sand Resort area.

Back to City (34-41km): Keep reminding myself to watch my pacing especially after the 29km mark. Heard stories from friends that after 30km mark usually its where the break in point is. Keep motivating myself to carry on with the run and look forward for the 32km and 37km mark as they both are left with 10km and 5km respectively. Constantly still applying deep heat on my calf and hamstring area.

Returning portion is like playing catching, trying to catch up with those who are in front of me. Caught up with Leming at Mountbatten Road while my OC at Esplanade.

Sunny at Mountbatten road caught up and overtook me, saying that he cant stand the pace of the rest. In the end saw him at Republic Ave, either had a bad cramp or muscle too sore to run. After overtaking my OC, i picked up my pace for the remaining 1+km to the finish line. (haha ego cant let him catch up!)

Finishing Point: Saw Wilson, still drenched in his sweat was thinking he could be just a few mins before me. Not for long, Sunny also finished the race. Overall ran 4:19:23 with average timing of 6:09 per km.

Timings of others

Charmane (Tri) - 3:57 (kanna OWED big time!)
Boon Howe (NS) - 4:12
Wilson (Tri) - 4:16
Daniel Toh (NS) - 4:19 (exactly same with me!)
Sunny (Tri) - 4:30
'Ah Lu' (Sec Sch) - 4:51
Gregory (NS) - 4:58
Zhi Feng (Tri) - 4:59
Wei Yang (Tri) - 5:03
Fat Cat' (Sec Sch) - 5:26
Kiat Rui (Tri) - 5:31
Jonathan (Tri) - 5:33

Post Race

Morning: Leg damn sore after the run, having a hard time walking down and up stairs, felt pain at knee cap.

Afternoon: Made booking for a full body message session at Statice located at AMK in the the evening. Thanks to it, my post race recovery was speedy. Anyway the message session is commendable, bought a $300 worth of message package from them, 1hr session for $30 or 30mins session for $15.

Evening: Back to camp, before sleep took a pill of Panadol for muscle and bone ache, anti-inflammatory pill. Hope it will aid in the recovery from the run.

Good Run!

42km Marathon Finisher

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