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I found this cactus at my cousin's place. 

Anyway, I am back in KL for a few days. Decided to come home for fun. I really wanted to watch Singapore's National Day Parade on the 9 August but I won't be back in Singapore. Then my friend said 'Why not just watch it on TV in KL?'

So here's something some Singaporeans probably dunno about Malaysia.

While Singapore can receive some Malaysian TV channels and parts of Johor can receive Singapore TV, not all parts of Malaysia can receive Singapore TV Channels. I am in KL, 323km away from the Little Red Dot. TV waves don't go that far.

More shocking is the discovery that some Singaporeans think all the water in peninsula Malaysia is supplied by Singapore! Gosh, you think the Little Red Dot supplies water to the whole of peninsula Malaysia???!!!

Singapore only provides water to parts of Johor. We surely don't see aqueducts and pipelines ranging from Singapore all the way to KL and to the northern states of Penang, Perak etc.

...and certainly we have enough people to provide pee to create our own Newater if we needed it. Fortunately for us, we don't have to recycle our pee.

Oh well, in a few days time I'll be drinking your pee again, my dear Singaporean friends.

I drank hell lotsa Newater during Law Camp and Freshmen Teambuilding Camp (FTB).

Speaking of FTB, here's what I think about it.

FTB wasn't exactly that great, nor was it that bad anyway. I have to give credit to the seniors for all their time and effort. It was a commendable effort on their part to come up with all the activities and everything else, and not forgetting it will last for 4 runs.

But in all that, I also have to admit that nothing is perfect and yes, there are things I wasn't too happy about.

The activities were fun in itself. The Horizontal Web, Inverted Cone, Rafting, Amazing Race and all that. But the reflections bit thereafter made it all lame. After each activity, we had to share our feelings and the lessons learnt with the rest of our group members all in the purpose of teambuilding and experience. Be that as it may, when these reflections are forced upon, it becomes more of something unpleasant. I for one didn't like the idea of doing the activity to have fun and after that come up with some reflection and application to real life.

How can these activities have relevance, if at all, to our life out of FTB?

Further, what the hell, our seniors think we can't manage our lives and need these reflections to survive SMU? At the very least, it is patronizing.

To say that the reflections in FTB are gonna help us in real life is lame. The setting for each game is different and nothing is close to real life. And even if it were, we the participants go for FTB in a different mindset than when we are doing school projects/presentations. We participate in the activities with the idea of bonding through fun, and not bonding by forcing out some learning points from activities with little or no relevance to our daily lives.

How can you make a big deal out of not planning and simulating in an activity which has barely any semblance to real life and also say we won't do well outside if we do not adhere to the principles in these activities?

Of course the point in all these reflections are not literal (I hope not) but it serves as a way to remind and instill in us the practice of planning and simulation - but then like I said earlier, don't we already know it?

Don't you think we have realized already that failing to plan is planning to fail?

Its plain insulting to have the sophomores, those one year our senior preach to us the importance of planning and simulation. Its as if we freshmen never thought of it and without these lessons, we would fail in SMU.

That said, I am not implying that the facilitators per se are bad or anything of the like, but I just am not agreeable with the way the camp was carried out. Nor am I implying that I am damned good and will excel at every single project/task coming my way.

The camp would've been much better if reflections weren't imposed upon us.

I really enjoyed the activities. The challenge was good, and it was through these activities that my group had lotsa fun together. Even without the reflections, I'd say that my group, or for that matter, any group would've bonded equally well anyway. The reflections are thus a redundancy, and unfortunately for me, it was a bad point of the camp.

Oh and I must say that The Original Game being dubbed TH-OR-G (pronounced The Orgy) is utterly childish. It is just coming up with a lame name just to give it a lame nickname. Its an artificial joke, if a joke at all, which fell flat on its face when no one laughed at its introduction.

It may not even be an original game. Law Camp had a much better murder mystery with far better acting and gameplay. I am without intention to compare between the two. I am just saying this isn't an Original Game after all, and even if it is, it is lame. For all I know, Law Camp may have koped the idea from FTB coz presumably planning for FTB would've commenced before Law Camp given its scale or even simply a traditional activity passed on over the years, but in any case, its still using a lame name to make a lame nickname. A desperate and failed attempt at humour. .

Try imagining yourself at the briefing of the game in the FTB Run 2 which I attended.

"The game we are about to play is THE ORGY!!! You know, The Original Game, The Or G, TH-OR-G"

How did the speaker expect the crowd to react?

"MUAHAHAHAHAHA!!! WOW SUCH A GREAT NAME!!! SO COOL AND WITTY!!! THE ORGY!!! OOOOH I CAN'T WAIT FOR THIS DAMN COOL NAMED GAME TO START!!!"

Instead, there was silence.

...

......

...

O.o

Gosh. The silence was resounding you could hear the speaker gulp in embarrassment.

In all, it wasn't 3 days wasted, but rather 3 days which could've been spent more productively.

...and not forgetting the scorching heat at East Coast. We pitched the tents on the parade square made of brick. The afternoon sun just burned everything. It made the floor a frying pan and our tents an oven all the way till night. The whole 3 days I was just sweating and sweating even after a cold shower. I didn't even need to use the sleeping bag. Not even as a bolster coz cuddling up means less surface area for the sea breeze (or the lack of) to cool me.

Without running the risk of sounding overly critical, I would like to reiterate that the activities were fun save for the reflections.

Nothing could be done about the heat wave. Oh maybe just not camping at the parade square and camp on a grass field instead?

Anyway, in all fairness I should also comment about Law Camp.

Law Camp could've been more fun if there were more inter-OG interaction. Friendly competition itself isn't sufficient in making all of us bond as a batch. Perhaps more group discussions and games could've been conducted. While I certainly had a great time with my group (SCARMAN!!!), I was also looking forward to meeting other people from the rest of Law School. I did meet a few while just waiting in queue or at the mens room, though I don't think that was enough.

Ah, and for Law Camp, the food was good. The sponsors were generous. Law Camp should be longer!

I felt that Law Camp ended too fast, while FTB was too draggy although both of them lasted for the same duration.