QM Session 1 :)

Hi guys this is RJ. Originally I wasn't supposed to be writing today's plog, but, as Anurak wasn't present for act today, I conveniently traded my Venture Camp blog post for this.

So, Quartermaster Session held by Tak Wei and Jack, both of them part of our very own 0106 batch. Generally as most might agree, today's act was rather slack for Ventures. Anyway, after the first horseshoe was called by the Venture Quartermasters and attendance taken, we got pumped. Acutally, we were pumping because the PLs and APLs were pumping for phailing attendance, so us pump happy doods also go and pump for fun. Only after we pumped finish the 28 then I realised the Ventures just got pumped by Tak Wei and Jack. Thanks.

So, the patrols were assigned to do the saikang associated with QM sessions: Kestrel and Eagle cleaning metallic objects, Falcon and KF doing Sailmaker's Whipping (jaaaack), Owl stock checking patrol tents and Hawk cleaning stoves. At least that was what was said in the proposal. I apparently saw Falcon cleaning stoves and Hawk whipping ropes though. Some switch.

Since the PLs go back to their old patrols to assist them in whatever they were doing, Francis went back to Eagle, Hiok to Hawk, Sup to Owl, Kuan to Falcon and Alvin to KF. Anurak, on the other hand, somehow joined Raffles Players two weeks ago after auditioning, according to him. So he now has LitRA, AEP, 01 and RP. Bomb. Prob because they needed to sabo someone to play the female roles, so might as well get one who will always do it. So I went back to Kestrel.

Since our job was to saikang and clean the metallic objects like saws, parangs and axes, we had to use sandpaper. When I looked at Eagle though, what they were using obviously wasn't sandpaper, and it turned out to be some 01 Official Receipt Paper. Imser, some foam, so I changed it for sandpaper. Later I found out Tak Wei had said to "Make do with it first", which is quite screw up for the VQM.

After all the saikang which was quite fast and 30 min ahead of time according to Tak, we went to go and help whip ropes, but almost everyone was stoning around talking cock. Only some were trying to even Sailmaker's Whip, which probably everyone forgot. Admittedly some were talking cock and whipping at the same time, like me *ahem*.

So next part of QM Session was distributing of cutlery, so we all went to the Den Storage Area to have fun. The APLs started to arm wrestle for the cutlery, and meanwhile the Ventures were huddled around Firdaus, very puzzled and suaning him a lot for his mat jokes.

"Bang who die?" "Hiok die." "No lah you die!"
"Bang who die?" "I DIE!" "Ya you die."

We all couldn't figure it out until it was realised that the first person who made a noise died. Damn lame la.

"How many meh meh jump over the wall?" *accompanied by a series of hand actions which probably had something to do with the answer*

Apparently only Amos (Leong) knew how to figure out the answer at first, dunno about whether we figured it out later.

Then got Francis' "____ can touch?" No one got it. A few people like Kuan or Amos (again, Leong) thought they got the answer, but after one more clue, they both realised they failed again.

Meanwhile the SU was having some lame joke competition, including some old jokes like "Pau eating himself", "blonde buying a T.V.", "A man walked into a bar ouch" which ended up being quite retarded. VU sent up two reps, Amos and Francis to tell lame jokes also. However they were so lame I can't remember them now. We kept asking Sup to go up, but he insisted he only knew racist jokes. Eeyur. Which was quite true anyway cos he started telling all the racist jokes he knew to the VU. Foaming, we went back to the den to get our stuff and to the canteen. Apparently what the SU did after that was rather *fun* (from the perception of the VQMs), but you'll have to ask Tak and Jack for the details.


It's Amos looking bored because he knows he can tell better jokes.


Tak and Jack sitting on the box, stoning and watching the SU.

YouTube random video from Owl Plog

lol, nothing better to do, post/ publicize these hilarious videos for all of you to see, dun want these funny moments in 01 left unnoticed, so yeah, take a look and enjoy!

Interpatrol 2006 result:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enkKcwisz-0



Anu Got Pumped In SUTC:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rd7ysfmu8_g&feature=channel_page



more in youtube, dun wana spam in this blog so if ya wana go take a look go there yourself.

HAPPY CHINESE NIU YEAR

新年快乐！

Happy Chinese New Year to all! Go out and grab those hongbaos that are waiting for you!

joel random- an insight into the ccal's house

after buying scout uniform from the scout shop (yesss that 'bring them to coffee shop teach them about scouting guy' wasn't there), alvin, kenneth and I went back to our primary school. after talking to our teachers, asking about the borrowing of the home econs room and stoning there for a while, i followed kenneth to his house. which was super random. while waiting for the bus, kenneth had to call home to tell his sis that i was coming as apparently, there was a possibility that she would scream when she realised that her 二哥 had brought someone to the house and the someone would see her without her pants on as she sometimes did that when she was at home, even when kenneth was around.

we took a bus to his house, nouvelle park (how to spell?). on the way to his house, kenneth kept saying that his house was small...but actually, the minute i stepped in, i thought that it was very nice. i was greeted by kenneth's sister at the com watching something on youtube related to miley cyrus and kenneth's bro who was lying on the bed. kenneth later confessed that her sis was obsessed with miley cyrus and easily gets obsessed with stuff. kenneth took over the com and started with his patrol logs.

at the com, kenneth was sorting out his patrol's patrol logs. downloading them from his email and copy and pasting the logs into the big word document. oh ya, before i forget, kenneth's computer screen is bomb big, i think its a 22 inch screen. anyway, good job jack, for staying up until 2am to finish your patrol logs. i really admire your devotion to the patrol. as for ming e... your logs are exttttrrrreeemmmmeeeelllllyyyyyyy hilarious. copy and pasting from wikipedia (how a refrigerator works), typing the word spam 72 times, having more than 600 words out of the 1k plus words in the patrol log being not related to the patrol log itself and copy and pasting words from an online thesaurus without removing the links. and kenneth's longest patrol log is 10k words. i had a real good laugh. kenneth said he was sian of doing patrol logs so he decided to show me some of his movies, some sick parts in 'hot fuzz' movie and some funny parts from 'dont mess with the zohan (soham)' dont forget to lend me your hard drive when school re opens.

kenneth has a pull up bar in his house! quite cool huh. maybe we can have a batch meeting at kenneth's house next time (i wont mind the lack of space). haha just joking. sadly kenneth kept emphasizing the point that his house was small. honestly, his house is the type of house i wouldnt mind living in. it was quite cosy and nice.

when it was around 3.45, we left, keeping to my promise that i would follow kenneth to collect his photos and then go home. kenneth and i crossed the road and walked through some hdbs to the photo printing shop. on the way, as we passed a bicycle shop, he asked me about bicycles as he wanted to be something like francis, the cyclist. but sadly, his dad would not allow it. after collecting his photos, kenneth walked me to the from where i could take a direct bus home. on the way, we talked about francis, kenneth and i cycling to the houses of the different people in the batch. oO maybe we can have that some day.

today's pics + video

Midweek Update

Hello! This is Bryan posting on this blog for the first time and the first time since P6 or sometime during that era.

Sadly, this post will be void of any pictures until someone(like Joel or some other guy who took shots and would like to post them here) edits my post and injects some colour into it.

Moving on to today's act. Well, there wasn't an actual name for it, unless you use the one on the VU calendar: "Survival Lecture" which is epic fail description.

So at 330, horseshoe was called and Anurak responded to the SU breakoff call for the Xth time. Maybe you have to break a certain height barrier to be free of the urge to respond to it. After breakoff, Chee Yeow called a Venture call about 20m away from the Gym hall atrium, but Mr Tan wanted to speak to the entire group, so it ended up being a "prank call".

Before I forget, welcome to the 4 new members of the Venture Batch; Amos, Kenneth, Ziheng, and Leonard.

Then we had PT (which, "by the way, means Physical Training" as quoted by Sup). The cunning Chee Yeow took careful measures to ensure that all muscles in our body were exercised well. Some examples were arms, legs, brains, abs (thanks to Anurak), and etc etc. Dunno why, but the leg training route was much more curvy than usual. Brain training involved finding X = Y^2 where X is the number of crunches we had to do and Y was some fail because it was always expressed in surd form! Should have done it in decimals, so there'd be a better challenge. But I'm not complaining, X = 35 is quite enough for me and probably the floor of the 3rd floor raja block.( I wouldn't be surprised if the sweat marks are permanent, especially Zhong Jun's)

And while training leg muscles, I got knocked down by a stationary car. Actually it was not stationary per se, because we all know that we are moving at 29,800 metres per second around the Sun. SO technically the so called "stationary car" was moving at 29,800 metres per second and I was moving at 29,801.5 metres per second, and we sort of crashed into each other. Something like that is inevitable, sadly. But I wonder why no one else has met with such an accident.

At 4+, we reached the Pull-up bars and since the SU was doing 15 pullups we had to do 16 because VU > SU. Or maybe because there exists some competitive spirit within the VTLs that cause them to automatically assume that VU > SU. Which may or may not necessarily be true. In the end, CCALs and ACCALs had to do 16, and the rest had to do 8. I think.

You see, a PT session is like a snowflake. No two are alike. In terms of distance ran, number of pull-ups done, number of push-ups, number of crunches, number of accidents with a stationary car. So its worthwhile to spend time commenting on every single PT session!

Now back to the REAL act of the day. The batch of 21 - 2 = 19 proceeded to the Junior Block. Supposed to be J1-07, but ended up as a scam because we got J1-03 instead. The main part of the act would be to introduce to the new members of 01 what we do regularly. Which according to Zhi Xuan, doesn't exist. I mean, he said something along the lines of "We have no routine activities in 01". But I'm getting ahead of myself. So there were like 7 presentations, ranging from 10++ slides (Money Matter$) to a really brief 4 slide show (CIP).

So basically there was Routine activities, by Sup, Rong Jun and Takwei. SPammed all the "routine" activities like PT in big, large, size 44 words, etc etc. The highlight of the powerpoint presentation was when the slide showed "Nike Hike" instead of, "Night Hight". Wait, I meant "Nike Hight". I meant "Night Hike". In other news, we caught a glimpse of the real Anurak in a picture.

In the presentation about camps, we learnt that VTC'09 is made up of 9 question marks in a row, and 2007 was a year with no camps as Francis had pictures for only 2006 and 2008.

THen came the Alvin "One-Man-Show" batch project presentation. He expertly analysed that all the 01-2006 batch projects have failed to various extents in 2007 and 2008. Just hope that this year won't be such a fail year I guess.

Then somewhere in between (Dang, I forgot the order) Anurak impressed us all with the 10++ slideshow Money Matter$ (I couldn't find the euro sign) and the importance of Jobweek and Donation Draw. Actually we all know that money is important, don't we?

CIP presentation. What to say? Very short. Like these sentences. We learnt that an ingenious board game designed by some people was inspired by the iPod game of the same mechanics! That increases the number of uses for an iPod to 357,392,102.

During the campfires presentation, we found out that 700 people came to our 01 Annual Show in 2008!(Thanks to Zhi Xuan). We also saw the impressive display of light energy created by the Owl Patrol in AC. Then came the 01 Annual Show 2007 Fantasma videos. All 18 minutes of them. For some reason, Joel had to click "Watch in high quality" when a video was fully loaded so we had to restart buffering. But luckily RIWLAN >>>>>>>> RI-Boarding internet, keep that in mind if anyone decides to live in boarding. Also shown was the Venture dance in that same Annual Show.

So at 620, Kenneth(the CCAL) taught the new members of our batch Horseshoe-ing 101. So now they should be very proficient.

Shortly after we were dismissed, the manly J1s showed us an 11.5 metre sherlashed pole which was supposed to be so much better than the one we built on saturday. But still, cannot lift up without seriously endangering the lives of anyone in the 11.5metre radius. Lol.

So that's all that happened today. Yay!

Batch Meeting

Today for act we had batch meeting. When I arrived at the Gym Hall with my other RE people, we found out that we had 3 new members joining 01 this year, Ziheng, Kenneth, and Amos, and all of them going to join the VU. From having an undersized batch to an oversized batch was no mean feat, but it was made possible thanks to our ambassadors Hiok Yang and Sup.

Anyway, since it was batch meeting, those who had scout uniform went to change before reporting in for horseshoe. Even after the horseshoe, some members were still coming in, so they were considered late. We went on to pump for a while with the PLs, before the J1s announced the PT I/Cs for the SU batches. After horseshoe, the ventures went to get their writing materials for batch meeting, and proceeded on to meet with our VTLs, which proved to be a cunning task.

We went wandered around the first 3 levels of the Raja block, due to some weird miscommunication between our dear CCAL and VTL. Joel joined us then, as he finished his prize presentation rehearsal. After quite awhile, Zhixuan finally revealed his hiding spot, which was in RJC.

Zhixuan designated the generic meeting spot for everyone in RJC, which was less than 50m from the linkway between RI and RJC(or RIJC). We spent awhile forming the horseshoe shape, which turned out pentagon, and got down to the meeting proper.

The batch meeting seemed more fruitful than any other batch meetings we had, and the scout uniform really helped in making the atmosphere more formal. Topics we touched on included our reflections on our sec 3 journey in 01, our goals for our venturing year, and our job scopes.

Before I forget, our VTLs got us up to participate in a lame circular activity. Quite obvious what it was from the start. It started out with a backrub, and I got to massage the shoulders of the bony god, before changing direction and massaging Firdaus. Due to our wealth of knowledge and experiences in batch bonding activities, we guessed what was coming next, and we guessed right. We sat on each others' lap in a circle, and the whole idea of the game was that if we did it right, we wouldn't really feel the weight of the guy sitting in front of you.

Anyway, Chee Yeow got Zhong Jun to draft out a rough timetable for future Pioneering Acts, in order to gage the time needed per act, so as a helpful co I/C, I closed one ear on the meeting to help out with estimating the manpower and time needed.

When the meeting was going to end, the VTLs passed around a stack of coloured paper for each of us to choose from. It wasn't really important, as they collected it back after the batch meeting ended as there wasn't enough time. -.-

We were running out of time, so our VTLs decided to dismiss us, and maybe continue with the coloured paper activity another day.

End of story.

Amos

Mini-Orientation

Monday, first day of the week, however, it was also the first PSGM session, and so all the sad class-based PSLs had to go to see their classes while the lucky ones like us waited for them. The SU also had activity; for them, it was a sort of a random PT act. Heard that the new PSLs had to do 200 push-ups. I say Good Job.

PSGM ends at 4.30, so the rest of us had a mini batch meeting to go over the agenda before the actual meeting after act. At about 4.40 everyone was there (woohoo everyone except marcus and soham, who had valid reasons), so we put our stuffs back and reported to third floor, admin block, to start the grand gala opening venture act (not counting Raffles Trail) of 2009…

**MINI ORIENTATION**

Woohoo. Session was hosted by Zhi Xuan and Chee Yeow, who were lubbing along a pretty shifty plastic bag. Full of suspicious shifty stuff… more on that later. First task of the day: All of the ventures linked arms and formed into a circle, with Chee Yeow inside. Then he tried to get out and we’re supposed to contain him. Haha, simple enough.

We failed.

Anyway, because we were all reeling from Chee Yeow’s surprising strength, we got another chance. This time, with experience, Chee Yeow had no chance of escape. To be sure we can ask Bryan to calculate his chances, but its quite pointless la. Next, the VTLs decided to switch mode to ‘cunning’ and get our beloved CCAL to join Chee Yeow in the circle. Tight fit haha. It was a bit harder, but certainly no kick for us. Not even Mas Selamat can escape. We just bent our knees and stood our ground until they gave up.

A short water break later, the fiendish ZX and Chee Yeow were ready with their next evil plan. It involves flour, mentos, a bowl, newspapers and a big mess. What a mess. Anyway the game was picking up mentos from a bowl of flour using only your mouth. We split into two groups for this game based on the chain of command. There are two sides: The Hiok Side or the Francis Side. Kind of like the two sides of the force, only easier to decide.

Starting off, Anurak dashed in for our team and emerges 0.1 milliseconds later with the mentos in his mouth and about a fifth of the flour on his face. The other team were just starting to move haha. During my turn I faced up against Jack, locked heads in an epic contest before I got my first taste of flour. It tastes… like the gunk at the bottom of milk containers, only thicker. Got the mentos first! =)


The game progressed for at least 3 rounds, and the teams were both quite evenly matched, although we were leading by a bit. This despite Kenneth colliding heads with Joel in his first round and getting owned. Apparently Joel has a pretty thick head. Around the second round, a new tactic emerged, which was to blow into the flour whenever the oppositions head get too close. This leads to an explosion of flour particles. Jon Ed jacked himself with this tactic. Hahaz.

Finally, the game ended and the Francis side won. And what a mess there was. We spent the next 10+ minutes cleaning up. Suffice to say that circular area looks about the same as it started. Our face became less pale lol.

Next game was the eternity game I think. Counting up to 20 was pretty easy because we followed a pattern and I think the game ended up a bit screwed. But never mind.

Moved to the S.R. field next, for another ‘very fun’ activity. It’s the activity where we lie in a row and one person from the start of the row rolls over everyone to get to the other end. Then the next person continues until you move a certain distance. Yeah, kind of like the push-up bridge except with higher emphasis on the effects of gravity. Pain. And apparently I’m pretty bony. Haha paiseh.

Rolling stone gathers no moss then.

It was about 6.10 then, and the activity was drawing to a close. But first…. Some group pictures! The 15 of us formed the numbers ’01-06’ on the field, with ZX going up to the 7th floor to take a picture. Pretty cool. We were doing a cheer at that time so many people had their mouths opened. Like me XD

And then another group picture with our beloved VTLs.

Venture 09! =D

(batch meeting after that. Reached home at 8.40pm haha)

Day before the trail...

So...today is the day before the Raffles Trail, where the sec 1s will be looking through all the CCAs booths and get to know what they are in for if they join the CCAs...blah blah. SO its basically an important event to showcase our best. The preparation session was quite usual for us i guess, i would think that we have done this many times before...

Ok so the day started off with the kitchen tent falling...due to the unusually strong winds, which were a constant bug throughout the day, but of course also rather cooling... We decided to go for lunch first, in hope that the winds will subside after that and make our job easier...but even after lunch the wind didnt change much, so no choice but to continue...We splitted up into a few groups, each group focusing on a particular task, like joel and amos were doing the bridge, and hiok, sup and rongjun were doing the gateway, while the rest started on the kitchen tent. There were some slight problems with the verticals, cos some of the nails/screws at the top were either too short or loose. Fortunately after some creative ideas, we managed to get everything up and standing. So I went over to help with the gateway, while Francis and Amos was doing the fencing. A lot of climbing up and down was involved la, to adjust the structure, hang up the flag, and then the banners, too long, fold in, slanted, retie. All for the sake of quality! Haha. An interesting sight, carrying tables around to climb on...

Then we did up the basha, which was one of the last things already, and I realised that we have been left with less people, haha, people have been streaming off slowly since the afternoon...busy people. Haha, so by now some people were taping up the display boards while Joel and I went to the storage to clean some metallic equipment. Might as well put the more specific steps here cos some patrols would have to do this for the upcoming qm session anyway, haha. ;) So first was the most tedious part of removing the rust using sandpaper. Heard that last year, the equipment displayed was below standards, so we tried o$ur best to really get off as much as possible... Then wiped the surface briefly to check the surface for any obvious marks and stuff, before using what we call the WD4D solution, to spray on the metallic surfaces and then wiping with the thin green sponges. This not only helps to remove the dirty stuff, it also makes the surfaces shine! =) Ok so thats about all... We all worked hard! haha, the cool strong winds were an interesting challenge too, blowing stuff around while also cooling us down. A good day of prep! =)

When the sails are up, we just need to wait for the winds...

Jack

Raffles Trail

After a day of mentally tiring lessons...okay i must admit it wasn't too bad since it was a friday and i got dismissed about half an hour early. anyway, after coming down from class and going to the 01 booth, some of the logistics were already there. i guess you figured out that the first thing i had to do was to help to bring the logistics. since some stuff was already there i only had to make 1 trip from the den. after all the logistics were brought to the booth, mr tan appeared with the marshmallows (yum) and some guys and i had to go help to tighten/ re-tie the lashings on the gateway and bridge which was quite shocking as most of them were quite loose. while we were doing that the logistics were being arranged.

when we finished our job, amos and i had to go to the rige/ rico classroom/ project room to get tables, 8 of them in total to be precise to be stacked in 2s so we could set up the poster boards. after finishing that task, we had to use our favourite gorilla tape to tape the poster boards to the table, which proved to be harder than it sounds. first thing: the wind was bomb strong, and due to the large surface area of the poster board, amos had to help to hold it down while it was being taped. the problems did not stop there. the second thing: after taping the poster boards to the tables, the poster boards caught the wind and the stacked table was blown down. because of that they had to be taken down and pasted on the gateway. getting owned by the wind...notice boards and tables being blowned down, it was like some hurricane was approaching the field in front of the raja block

the troubles brought by the wind did not stop there. i was asked over and over again to un-tangle the banner on the gateway and paste more gorilla tape onto the raffia securing the flag or banners to the gateway so as to prevent the wind from doing anymore damage. after that there were even more poster boards to set up on the fence. seeing that the wind was very strong, kenneth had to peg the tables used in the booth to hold up poster boards down to the ground.

it was kind of late when we finally went to change into scout u. after changing in the den, the j1s whom had tied a flag staff asked zhong jun and i to carry it back to the booth so it could be erected (maybe to keep up with the competition?) the sec 1s were already streaming in by the time i got there and the guides were doing quite a good job. and firdaus arrived! making it kenneth zhong jun, rong jun, amos, francis, firdaus, bryan and i there. the ropes on the bridge was getting loose again, while the sec 1s walked over the bridge, i had to hold it up so that john trach could tie the sq lash :S because the wind was so strong, the guides, amos and i switched to booth maintenance (MAN-tenance - add in the jensen accent) to keep everything in check.

then some food arrived and we took turns to eat our lunch. this is where kenneth started to angst (i understand) us to stop slacking. the parents trail started and i took some parents for a tour around the booth. talk talk talk...explain explain explain... until it was over. the sec 2s helped to take down the kitchen tent, gateway and bridge and helped to bring the logistics and the poles back to the den. the sec 2s were dismissed and (half) the VU had a short debrief about the whole raffles trail thing (planning and the acts) i felt quite bad after what kenneth had told me...sorry :/ after that we had to pack up and wash the pickets and pegs and put everything back into place.

Hamsters for Friend-ster

Hey all,

I have been doing some research regarding hamsters, and HURRAY GOOD NEWS, we do not need to spend a cent on our new batch pets, because we can simply get it for free! why is that? i surfed online and i found out that there are many people putting their little hammies for adoption! There are many types available too, and some of them are only a few months old, so I see no point in spending our money on a hamster, don't you agree? If you are afraid that the hamsters are of low quality (disfigured or lame), then I am not so sure about this part, all I know is that the owners want to give away their hamsters because they accidentally breed them, so yeah, ignorance, never used condom. But all the hamsters look the same to me, the only way I can differentiate them is their colors, so I don't mind getting any of the hamsters for adoption, as long they are only a few months old. there are some jokers putting up hamsters which are like 2 years old plus for adoption, weirdoes...

Any of you that got a violent objection against adopting hamsters, and rather buy, please tell me, we will see how it goes. Buying a hamster is also not that expensive, plus it will be of pure breed, the cheapest you can get is $10+, at the pet shop in Plaza Singapura, not sure of the type though, usually the cage is expensive, if it is a good one, costs $30 at minimum. this is worth spending for as hamsters love to chew and nib at almost everything, so their cage is not an exception. Silent wheels cost $13, food bowls cost $2 or less, bottles about $6 for quite a big one, bedding around $6, sandbath cheapest $13 for 1 kg.

so to summarize, the total budgets for everything the little hamsters need are as followed:
a hamster - at least $10
a good cage - at least $30
a silent wheel - $13
a food bowl - $2
a big bottle for 2 hamsters - $6
bedding - $6
sand for bathing - at least $13

TOTAL --- $80 (at least)

ya, this is what I have researched, so maybe the pet shops are not that generous, lol rhyme.

so give me your opinion on this, if we want to adopt, no prob, if we want to buy, also no prob, so everything no prob, any prob tell me, i will go and do the proposal now

this is our virtual hamster, it's blue, it's kinda cool, it's Ignatius, name after my friend who looks like him. ;p

adopt your own virtual pet!

Briefing: Raffles Trail

Well the day started rather well. Most of the Ventures reported to the den quite sleepy. This was due to an amazing and absolutely fascinating RE talk that everyone kinda fell asleep at due to its nature. Seeing as its the first week of school and all, thats probably just natural and expected. We haven't fully regained our 1 hours attention span or even our 1 hour sleep-with-eyes-open skill. 

We changed like as though it was our first SUTC night call. Slow and half asleep. Thats just exaggeration. We were actually talking to the GC who were there and changing. You  see, the thing is that, you don't do that in SUTC. SUTC is like a wife nagging at her husband. The J1s talk, you shut up and give standard answers like: 3-2-1 PER START! And how in the world did i get so out of point... So yea we changed and soon there was a horseshoe. Kenneth talked to the sec 2s and then attendance taking occurred. 

First problem. Kestrel got no attendance to take. There were 5 patrols. It was kind of comical, but expected actually, seeing as there is only 1 batch attending these activities. But Adam did turn up in the end and so we had 6 patrols again. 

The Ventures present were: Kenneth, Francis (myself), Joel, Amos, Zhong Jun, Rong Jun, Soham, Bryan, Firdaus. Yes, that was NOT a typo. Firdaus was there. Yay!! Oh and the whole GC. They are all ventures also.

Next up was a quick run to LT 2. Only Zhong Jun, Joel and myself were running. We ran, with Zhong Jun carrying his laptop and about 20 metres away, trailing us like a bunch of sec 2s trying to meet a deadline, was erm.... a bunch of sec 2s trying to meet a deadline. 

We set up the laptop and Joel and i realised what a cool and innovative password Zhong Jun had. And as some other ventures also learned earlier in the day, Zhong Jun's laptop's touchpad buttons are SPECIAL. Left button is right click and right button is left click... The epitome of GL.

Then was a briefing on Raffles Trail. Roles, what to say, what will be happening, when to report, etc. First failure was that, LT 2 did not have a cable or port to connect to the projector... So that was a pretty big fail. But never mind, people with great skill and dexterity use their brains and still briefed the sec 2s with the relevant information they needed.

Failure no.2 was that i used a permanent marker on the board. Personally, i think that whiteboards should be made such that permanent markers are not permanent on them. Yes i know that make permanent markers redundant. Do you have a problem with that? Look man, nothing in this world is permanent, stop fooling yourself with these illusions and fantasies of PERMANENT markers. 

But yea we got through the presentation. And Mr Yuen talked to the sec 2s also. Meanwhile Joel and i tried to undo my giant ugly handwriting on the board. Mr Yuen helped us through most of the FAQ that the parents ask and also he helped us brush up the sec 2s' knowledge of 01. 

And we chionged to S.R block to start setting up the gateway and bridge and kitchen tent. 

I was with the gateway people most of the time, so i didn't really know what was happening. Fail no.3 kind of involved 02, but we settled that and now things are fine. 

Fail no.4,5,6,7,8,9,10. etc are most of the square lashes and one quadrapod lash that were loose or coming loose. Oh and the mega one where the base of the quadrapod wasn't aligned. But never mind, all those were fixed and settled. I guess the sec 2s were having fun setting up the booth. 

We corrected some things and also modified some after some discussions and comments from the GC. 

Now that is basically what we did for most of the act. What surprises me is that the sec 2s seemed to have done a better job at Westlake than here in home ground, RI. Maybe it was the PT? Or the environment? Well, we'll never know will we? Let this be a mystery that shall ever astound you and make you ask: Why? Why do ducks quack and chickens cross roads? Why did Kenneth mallet the picket so deep in?

Now let me tell you a story of a boy. Now, in AC'08, in the photo slideshow done by Ming E, this boy was the boy that wanted to fly. Or something along those lines. Now he apparently was sick of the sky and wanted to live underground. He took a picket, and using his well trained and mega muscles which were once used for flying, he hit the picket into the ground. With one hit, and using his bare knuckles, he hit the picket in so deep that it nearly reached hell. (Well in all honesty, it was a few hits and with a mallet, but where's the fun in that?)

The next half an hour was spent undoing this latest fail. By then the PSLs had already ended the Secondary One Orientation Camp, themed: Infinite. (the last "e" should be some frenchy line kinda letter thing). They ended off with a loud {SAY RA-RA-RA-RAFFLES} x3 *clap clap clap* RAFFLES. I have no idea what the name of that cheer is. 

So yea, most of the batch was there. Now back to the story. This boy then had a problem. He couldn't pull out the picket. So Kenneth was there trying to pull out the picket and meanwhile everyone else was there commenting and trying and giving advice. Some Excalibur thing. Whoever could pull the picket out of the ground becomes King or something. So yea we slowly tried all sorts of methods. The rope we tied through it to try pull it out broke. The hammer nearly detached it's head. The hammer handle made creaky noises. The ground got wet. We found a random metal rod and we stuck that in the ground also.

After many many tries and methods, it was finally getting loose. And then Rong Jun, reached the climax of his cunning plan. He just pulled out the picket. Well... Seeing as it was already quite loose and the people who had been working on it were quite tired... It's quite a cunning and successful plan. 

Then we packed up and left. 

No we did not take down everything we just set up... We packed up the loose bits and then left.

First VPA! (Venture Planned Act)

Success!!

We had just come back from sand-castle building and we were sandy, burned, lala and HAWT (as usual). 

Seeing as the PSLs wouldn't be joining us, the few of us met at the den at 1.30 after lunching at the canteen. 

For attendance, there was: Kenneth, Francis, Amos, Joel, Zhong Jun, Rong Jun, Soham, Bryan.

So we met at the den and then moved to the storage den with Ram the GQM. Where we then proceeded to get stuff we needed for the act. Getting the python was some obstacle course lah. I crawled under the table which was covered and overflowing with cooking utensils and cutlery and pots and pans and all that. Then once in there i had to pull out the pythons and then also the pegs. 15 pegs. We got out the banners and pickets also. Ram and Kenneth played with the discus... Which honestly can be used as a carrom seed, you use that right, confirm win. Cos the white cannot score the discus. =P

After moving stuff over to the den, some of us went to see the sec 1s doing their blindfold walk thingy. And we "helped" the PSLs there. Looking at the sec 1s, i think they are generally ok lah, but some quite screw up, like the "kicker" and the "spitter". Those that respond when i talk to them are generally ok, at least they don't dao. 

Then the Teenage Mutant Neeeeenjas went to Braddell Westlake with Ram. They were an advance party to go set up the place to receive the sec 2s, the only batch coming for this act. This party consisted of Amos, Joel, Soham and Francis (myself). Ram being there to make sure we didn't accidently kill anyone along the way with our awesomeness. 

Ok enough with the cockster stuff. We got there, gave the guard the letter, started picking poles. *Vibrate vibrate* *Pick up phone* And taadaaa Kenneth told us the sec 2s were at the RJC gate... And we hadn't even picked out 1 pole yet...

So we went into hyperdrive and started ripping poles out of the pole shed. Ram sat there to make sure we didn't damage the poles. Suddenly the weight of responsibilities of the QM falls on Ram and with his "Lock Cutter of Proper QM Procedure", he makes sure we didn't destroy the poles. Basically he sat there and warned us not to own the poles.

The sec 2s arrived. Help in the form of the other Ventures arrived. Pole picking leveled up. The poles flew out of the shed. Meanwhile, Jonathan Trachsel and Poh Chu Yong, our beloved and most inspiring STLs distracted the sec 2s by running around the place and doing our favourite activity: PT! 

And our very own VTL Zhi Xuan helped us pick poles. So the building of structures started on time, as according to the timeline on the proposal. The sec 2s, +Francis + Zhong Jun + Rong Jun + Soham were set on the task of building the gateway for Raffles Trail. While Kenneth, Amos, Joel, Bryan and the STLs and VTL and Ram and Wayne and Jeremy went on the build the bridge. 

I think we pretty much accomplished teaching the sec 2s figure-of-8 lashing AKA tripod lashing. Then we erected the 2 tripods and one quadrapod. And the sec 2s got to work on tying square lashes. Most of them were pretty tight and only a few were loose lashings. And then we started tying on the other decorative parts of the structure. 

Overall, i think the sec 2s are quite close as a batch and can work together. Although this time there were too many of them stoning and not doing anything. Or some lashings had 4 people around it... Too many cooks spoil the broth. Too many scouts spoil the lashing. But in general, good job 01-08!

But i have to say i'm quite jealous. Their first batch structure quite big and nice and simple. Ours was spam lot of lashings. 3 trestle frames man... Haha. But we had fun. I think we have to do one more batch structure together soon. Like for pioneering act... Haha. 

And that is it for our first VPA.

On a side note, on Tuesday, 6th Jan 2009, Zhong Jun, Joel, Amos, Kenneth and Francis stayed back in school to print, cut and fold pamphlets. Wow that was fun! (insert sarcastic tone)

This programme was brought to you by Francis. Please don't make him spam posts here, he has another blog to keep alive. And he thinks the other blog is getting jealous. 

Official start of VENTURE 09

Kenneth


First day of school today, first near-full batch meeting we had. And also first parade commanding of the year, done by ME!

Attendance:
Kenneth
Hiok Yang
Jon Ed
Alvin
Anurak
Tak Wei
Jack
Amos
Zhong Jun
Suphasak
Rong Jun
Joel
Soham

So the meeting was at a very nice and cosy meeting place, 4th floor Junior Block. No one disturbed us at all, which was really perfect. Only thing is its bomb hot there, dumb fan wasn't working. But other than that, we had a good 2 hr meeting from 2-4pm.

The issues we discussed were:
1. Raffles Trail
2. NYAA CIP
3. Batch Project
4. NYAA Skills
5. Batch pet
6. Friday PT
7. Campfire grouping
8. Batch Clothing
9. Scout Uniform
10. Next meeting

First thing was basically to inform them whats happening currently for RT, and clarify some stuff with them as well as tell them their roles. After that we talked about NYAA CIP and decided on doing tutoring with kids. Following that was batch project which would be den upgrading. Then NYAA skills, turns out Jon Ed's Mum agreed to teach us. Thanks a lot! We agreed to have a batch pet, a hamster. Then Friday PT was just to tell them about my plan, and we fixed the tentative timing as 2pm every Friday. For campfires, we decided to split it into groupings, and it is as follows:
1st group: Kenneth, Anurak, Soham, Joel Bryan
2nd group: Hiok Yang, Zhong Jun, Amos, Jack, Tak Wei
3rd group: Francis, Alvin, Suphasak, Rong Jun, Jon Ed

For clothing, we decided to make a tshirt after all for our batch clothing. Next was Scout Uniform, and the tentative date for going to Scout HQ to buy uniform parts would be 23rd Jan, Friday. And the next meeting we would have is gonna be 12th Jan, Monday after activity.

These are the tasks to be done:
1. Raffles Trail - Kenneth/Anurak
Final changes to proposal and pamphlet (4th Jan)
Print out pamphlets and photocopy (5th Jan)
Pass to teachers for cutting (6th Jan)
Folding pamphlets (6th Jan)
Check logistics (5th Jan)

2. NYAA CIP - Alvin
Find list of emails of organisations for tutoring(12th Jan)
Draft email to be sent (12th Jan)

3. Batch Project - Hiok Yang/Joel
Work with Jeremy for den upgrading

4. NYAA Skills - Jon Ed
Find out if CC allows booking of classroom for cooking and price (4th Jan)
Find out what they provide in the classroom (4th Jan)

5. Batch pet - Suphasak
Find out price of 2 hamsters, cage, food, water (12th Jan)
Draft proposal with prices and roster (12th Jan)

6. Friday PT - Kenneth/Francis
Find out NAPFA results of Sec 3s and 2s (4th Jan)
Draft proposal (12th Jan)

7. Batch Clothing - Anurak
Draw multiple designs for tshirt (12th Jan)
Find out price quotation (15th Jan)

8. Scout Uniform - All
Buy uniform parts together on 23rd Jan (tentative)
Those unable to make it on 23rd are to email to Kenneth
Sew First Aid Badge, District Badge, Name Tag and Venture Tag

9. Pioneering Act - Amos/Zhong Jun
Design the structure (11th Jan)

10. Others
Jack to register for NYAA ASAP