DE camp
Day 0: The campers reported late and the EXCOs had to punish them. The campers were made to do push-ups for quite a bit. I thought that my group got a lot of attutide people but it turned out that during the ice-breakers that they were really nice people!! After that, it was my value-workshop. Everyone turned up on time and I thought that everyone had a fruitful discussion. My group was so vocal in discussing problems that they faced in their class. They were so enthu about it which made the process enjoyable!
Day 1 and 2: We left for LAC to the high elements. My group was looking forward to the high elements. They participated and tried their best from what I saw. Initially, they didn't cheer and encourage each other but later, they started to be more bonded and even screamed and gave direction to the other campers! On both days in the afternoon, I went down with 8 other people to do the centre-piece for the sand-castle activity that we were going to carry out on Day 3. The process was tough because we were there piling up the sand and carrying the water from the sea to the place. Others were helping in the making of the sand. The process was tough because I was doing the carrying part. My back hurt and I sustained some injuries along the way. Anyway, the centre piece kept collapsing. It collapsed twice in the 2 days that we went down. We had to re-build every single thing. Everything happened so fast in a split second that our hearts dropped together with the sand. Anyway, we pulled ourselves together and really showed what it meant by teamwork which led to the completion of the centre piece. I wanted to thank Miss Siau and Miss Joy Tan for supporting us there. They bought some food and drinks for us knowing that we couldn't use our hands. It was so nice of them because they were using their own money to pay. (I piled the sand and made a flower-shaped figure where people commented that it looked like a sun.) -_-..
On Day 2, Honourable sang birthday song to me. They sang it four time. We sat down during one of the facilitation and asked them some questions about the camp at the moment. They told us a lot of opinions but they commented that we earned their respect and they respected us because we deserved it. I thought that was the best birthday present that I could ever receive from them. It was so nice of them to tell us this. I wanted to thank all the people who sms me to wish me happy birthday at exactly 12mm on 27th May and those who tried to be the last to sms me. Haha.. I also wanted to thank all DE SIs and teachers. They bought me birthday cake and sang even though it was 1am in the morning after de-briefing. I'm really very touched because I never had such a big group of people helping me to celebrate.
People said I looked sad at the time. It was because my grandfather's sister passed away at that time. I just got the message. The reason of her death was starved to death. I was damned angry because her 2 grandsons who had already went through NS snatched all the food away from her and ate every single food at home. This happened for the past 6months. I was very angry with those unfillial ignorant people. Now then they started to cry during her funeral. What's the use?
Day 3: We had 1 high element and later we were ready to go for the sandcastle activity. Honourable felt so sad when they knew that one of the high elements was cancelled. But nevertheless, their moral was still extremely high! The cleaning up by the DE campers was extremely fast! All they took was 15minutes to clean up everything single place which amused all of us! Lunch before setting off was the best meal for the past few days because those previous meals were extremely oily. Well everyone enjoyed it alot! Sandcastle was fun! Everyone enjoyed building especially the SIs! The campers from both AB and DE were to make a AJ campus using sand. The instrutors were instructed not to help them when the campers never told us to. So we were walking around. The AB campers didn't know the DE instructors and asked us to help out. Anyway, we just helped out. A lot of funny thing happened!! The AB campers scolded a lot of DE SIs for not following their instructions. When they knew who we were, they started to apologise profusely. Haha.. So malu!! Anyway, the whole sandcastle was fun and I’m sure all enjoyed it a lot!!
Day 4 and 5: We had SL project in the morning. Honourable combined with Integrity to carry out this service learning project. We were supposed to bring 100 kids to Changi Airport to carry out an amazing race thingy. We had a Reece in the morning and we brought the campers to the different locations and checkpoints. Later, we broke off for lunch. The 3 of us ( Charmine, Shi Hao and I) treated them to Popeye’s Chicken. That motivated them to do well for the SL I guessed. When we reached the gathering area which was the viewing mall, it was extremely noisy. The kids were like released animals from the cages. They were screaming and shouting at the top of their voice. They took 20minutes just to sit down, not including the time to ask them to keep quiet. LOL!! It was extremely chaotic!! But later when they were split up into 9 groups where our campers would attach themselves to one group, it was much better. LOL!! The whole thing was a success as the kids enjoyed themselves a lot as seem from the way they responded to the questions. On the way back to school, because we were late, Honourable and Integrity ran all the way from YCK MRT station to AJ. They kept saying have sense of urgency but we didn’t remind them at all. They had learned to take their own initiative. It was quite happy to see that scene. At night around 10, we had our activity called letter of encouragement. Everyone in my group was writing and thinking what to write in the letter. Well, I hoped this will help them in some way because this activity was carried out last year and I still kept that piece of paper. Later after that, we set off for Land Expedition. We walked from AJ to Sewbawang beach. There were 3 checkpoints and 4 maps. There were games at each checkpoint and it was damn funny!! The 1st checkpoint was the Hand and Leg game. There were 8pieces of papers on the ground. They had to use their body parts to fulfill the game requirements. There were 3 levels that they had to go through before they could get the next map. It was super funny!!
Level 1
5 palms on 1
6 fingers on 5 and 2
3 knees on 6 and 4
4elbows on 3, 7 and 8
Level 2
15 fingernails on 6 and 5
6 heels on 2 and 4
6 ears on 3 and 8
1 butt on 7
3 toes on 1
Level 3
4 noses on 2 and 4
6 cheeks on 7, 1 and 5
3 heads on 3 and 6
3 shoulders on 8
My group said that this game was disgusting! Can you spot some things about the different levels and tell me the disgusting things?? Haha.. Charmine and I thought of all this. Hahaha..
Then the second checkpoint was the night walk around YiShun Park. I was set up because of MELVIN TAN!! I won’t forget this!! Shall not elaborate further!!
Last checkpoint was the reflection part. From what they had said, I felt that we had done what we were supposed to do. I felt that all our efforts that we had put in were worthwhile!
They set off with a target of reaching the final destination at 4am in the morning and they did it despite the fact that we had to stop at certain points in time due to wild dogs, other groups not completing the checkpoints yet. They had built up and had a common vision for their team. They had proven and given me one more reason to say that they had really grown from 1st day where they never cared about each other to now that they offered to help each other to achieve a success in this.
DE has already ended and I guessed everyone was very happy about it! I have some words for my group, HONOURABLE! I only have I’m really proud of you all!! They really have grown from the 1st day I met them!! I hope that you will continue to grow as a class leader and make AJ proud!! YEA!! Cheers!
I just went out today with my secondary school friends and seniors to celebrate my belated birthday! It was fun with them. Still remember the joy that we always have together!! Thanks alot!!