Best viewed in Google Chrome, screen resolution 1280 x 1024.
Do not put too much content under each header or else some of the content could not be seen.
|
posted : Saturday, 4 June 2011
title : Joke Gone Too Far, maybe?
 im sorry for this morning, as in, i didnt know you'll get mad at that, really. now you're not replying me. i hope to heaven its cos your phone died. please. im gonna talk about a couple of things that been bothering me, or US, for the last coupla weeks. firstly, ncc. to part as. youre not even a year into the cca, STOP JUDGING PEOPLE. ok i guess im not one to say, cos i myself have been in your position, and i understand that what you see projected on the outside is what you assess the situation to be. if i asked, "do you understand that people may be double-sided?" of course you'll answer confidently with a yes, but youre not in the stage yet, to make use of these pockets of human understanding in daily life. i must say, i hope you'll grow to understand the purpose behind what we do. theres a purpose we dont let you talk to your seniors, theres a reason the tradition exists, and im just gonna be direct about it here. if you talk to your seniors, chances are, connections will be formed, no matter how slight, it will be there. right now, we tell you, "your platoonmates are the ones who will stick with you through your years in ncc, bond as a platoon cos you'll only have each other to depend on." but lets see the situation differently. suppose you were allowed to talk to your seniors. should you run into a problem, view the options: 1. seniors: more experienced and more likely to have come across the same problem when they were juniors 2. platoonmates: as inexperienced as you are, and is currently stuck in the same dilemma just use your common sense. as a HUMAN, which would you choose? its obvious. just to solve the problem (which you will view as "helping" your platoon), you turn to your seniors. from here, we branch into two roads. first road: you are a part a, in ncc. obviously you'll face many problems, whether in terms of uniform prep, studying for things (ok maybe this is more for part cs), practising drills, platoon problems, or senior problems. sure, you will say that you'll definitely turn to your platoonmates first, and only if there is absolutely no way to solve it, only then will you "ask the seniors for advice". as a part a in ncc, i always knew that there were just some things beyond my control, and whos the best to ask advice from? experienced seniors of course! alright i may sound sarcastic here and there, but im really pissed at this. yeah, so you turn to seniors for this, you turn to seniors for that, when youre sec 4 and leading the entire company, WHO DO YOU TURN TO NOW? you may not know this but just because we're sec 4s doesn't mean we can control the world, there are higher powers and things that we cant control too. im not implying that youre definitely gonna crumble and die of course, but honestly, when you know that theres always someone you can turn to for help, theres always this reliance on that person; even if the reliance isnt active all the time, its definitely there as a fallback plan. ok lets have an analogy: ok i got this out of perak 2010, the water confidence test before white water rafting. in the test, we had to float our way down the rapids and then attempt swimming to the bank on the other side. of course, as a safety measure, our instructors would throw out a line for us to catch in case we dont make it. answer me honestly. would you have swum harder than ever against your own limits, with or without the line? key word here is harder. yeah sure, you may swim with all your might to get to the other side, but theres always this reassurance that oh, even if you dont make it, theres always something to grab hold onto. and what if, you ask, you just cant make it and get washed away? now that, is what your ncos are for. the things is, we dont want you to rely on your seniors, im not even calling it over-reliance, just reliance. because when you rely on someone else, you need that person, they are more powerful than you, and you start to believe in your own strengths less and less. but part as, this is not true. a silent (or maybe not so) crush on a senior is acceptable and we're not blaming you for that, but any form of communication whether direct text or smoke signals set through the sky hoping that the other will see, just shows that youre insecure with your own abilities and need reassurance, somehow. road two: your platoon bond will be weakened. yes, you do have your platoon lunches, your platoon drill practice sessions, platoon standardised items, platoon outings and so on. i know, cos we had these too. but these do not create a strong bond. key word here is strong. cos im pretty sure you have class outings and class lunches and hey, a class tee coming up, so shouldnt that make you as close to your class as you are to your platoonmates? as a part a, i would have answered, no. why, because the bond is derived from all the shit you go through together, the hours spent, the tears shed, the blood and the screams, the manic confusion as you get tirelessly beaten down continuously. then amidst this horror, there comes enjoyment. sure, it may be a little chat, but im sure you feel a small blossom of pure joy. if i were in your shoes, i'd say, yeah, but the seniors dont go through the same things as us what, so surely we'll be closer to our own platoonmates. for the first part, i wholly agree, every platoon has its own story. but as a senior, i do know that every platoon has its misfits, people who just dont try to fit in no matter what you do. even if theyre okay when theyre around you, they wont happily volunteer to organise things or go for most platoon outings, and i guess theyre not to be blamed, cos everyone's a misfit in different contexts. and this brings me back to the classroom context: every class, like it or not, has people who are definitely just not part of the class. as a random member of the class, let me ask you this: would you more likely be closer to the person when you function as a class of 37, or when you function as a group of 6? the answer is obvious too. when you have many sources to rely on, there is little or less need to incorporate the manpower of every member. when you have say, a platoon of 10 plus about a bunch of 20 seniors you can talk to, the need to seek support from a distant member of your platoon is is seriously very minimal. honestly, if you could talk to your seniors, this would become some platoon of 30 and seriously, why would you even need the distant member's help? -.-" compare this, to say, only a platoon of 10, to achieve the same goal, you would more likely need the support of even the distant member. ok let me give a worse case (the chances of this happening is minimal because juniors and seniors dont talk thank god.) : when every platoon has its people who dont fit in, naturally, if you and your seniors can talk about your side on platoon problems, so can these misfits. after a while, if you dont include them so much, they see more of a reliance on their seniors and juniors respectively, instead of their own platoonmates. opposing views start to form and well, yeah. war. ok maybe im exaggerating a little but, knowing how our company is very extreme.. and for some reason, since air and us are always compared, so why is this rule so strongly pressed on us as compared to air? because we value our platoonmates more. thats my honest opinion. now im not hating on air or anything cos for god's sake the whole world knows im close to air (theyre nice people! :D) so im gonna tweak the meaning of value a bit here. they have a company strength of 68. we are down to 39. thats about half their size. this literally translates to three words: short of manpower. what they can do with 68 people, we have to do with 39, thats why we need every single one of you to be involved and not too far off. this isnt a competition between us and air, its just that, hey, we're both under hq, whatever hq wants us to do, its the same for both of us. thats what i mean by we value our platoonmates more, we want every single one of them to be there when we need them. just know, you need your platoonmates as much as they need you. dont walk with your nose up to the sky, that you dont notice the flowers by the path. dont keep looking towards your seniors, that you dont notice platoonmates beside you all along. |
It's best to keep it short and sweet. (:
