this is the first time that i got SOOOOOOOOOOOO many mosquito bites in my life. not even when i was at pulau ubin for the obs mobile course 4years ago. HUNDRED OVER bites leh. now my arms and legs looked terrifying. =x

anyway. group camp'07 has its ups and downs in the duration. from the miscommunication to glitches in the execution of plans and seeing the cute cub scouts again to taking care of the cubs and scouts. (and i decided to write everything down after so many editing. haha)

first two days were at Pulau Ubin and we called it Lost... At Nibu Island. the Nibu island came about during the first meeting when we were deciding on the theme and it just got to me that to reverse Ubin and thus Nibu. and the planning comm are supposed to be the Nibites (the costume is the Shrek ears!) and shaun Captain Emo while the participants are the researchers who boarded the submarine (bumboat actually) for some exploration. my patrol is the Singaporeans with me as the leader and the other patrol is the Malaysians. my patrol consisted of jeremy tzewei grace mervyn derrick. and they are a bunch of funny people! like derrick who loves climbing trees! they called me the turtle cuz of my hydration bag under the poncho looked like a green shell (it rained during the station games). and hunch-backed. =x but the 龟帮 (my sect cuz i'm the patrol leader) was a great group nonetheless! :D

eka shanhong joined us in the evening and we did backwoodsman cooking. was interesting cuz i've never done cooking without mess tins solid fuels etc and eating without the utensils! thankfully e rovers brought a bamboo back and we got chopsticks from cutting the bamboo! and it was a full moon night! enjoyed it. but too bad the stars weren't as much as what we've seen as desaru. then did reflections when i was talking too loudly (shaun david.wong were suaning me about the loudness of my voice during debrief lor) and then lights out for the participants and debrief for planning comm. started to pack up after that and thus didn't sleep. thank goodness there's the hidden package of food from belynda. oreos! (:

then had e fast march where grace supposedly went missing. then e solo night walk to merdah hut and then e doubles night walk up to e quarry. soon after everyone got there it was time to cook for the v1s. initially i just wanted to sleep and not to help out, but since the rest of the planning comm went up, i followed them up after all. and it was a good decision, cuz the scenery from the top of the quarry is BEAUTIFUL. and everyone was dozing off so i kept talking (no wonder xx said i talked non-stop) i suaned david wong from being so high. (he said he drank milk) the porridge was so delicious and i wanted to eat it all by myself. =p


then it was breakfast time and then heading back to the jetty. fast-marched with david wong at a point of time (he helped me carry my shoe bag and first aid kit) and i called him 黄ah pek cuz he called xiuxian Lee ahma. he called me chong ahma when we were at Kallang ssc. lol. back at singapore, wanted to put on my contacts but realised i've dropped my right eye contact when i took them off while at quarry in the dark. so suay! and my newly-bought hydration pack burst on e first day! thank goodness elizabeth lent me hers.

then dragonboating at Kallang SSC. zhengyang siewjing joined us and we had quite some fun. the instructor wore super high fbt that fitted so tightly. OHMANN. maybe i should consider dragonboating as a cca in uni. heh. then we headed for Camp Christine, where e scouts and cubs were at! many people slept along the way and i only slept when we were reaching soon. lol.

set up the tents and then had pioneering. after that is announcing the patrols for the amazing race for the next day. got into patrol 2 (e tiger patrol) which was called Big Mac. and there was another patrol called Chicken McNuggets. lol. my patrol's kids are funny okay. got this assistant sixer who kept shouting molest when i hit him and when i didn't even touch him at all. derrick (v1) even mimicked him la! ha. then another cub gavin who gave me some sentosa pass and told me some stuff, like a fellow patrol member who had diarrhoea and passed motion outside their tent and attracted many flies. and a scout bryan who looked well like a cub cuz of his height. =p and a cub jasper who thought that i looked like secondary 2 or 3. hehe. =D

had water bomb game with them and then reflections later on. joined the v1s as they had their interviews with david wong shaun xiuxian alfred. took several photos, such as mervyn in his shrek hairband. lol! managed to have some sleep for like 4 hours. and that's how much i've slept for the whole camp.

then it's e amazing race. it was great, like knowing my patrol better (like a cub, joisah who was supposedly to be scared of me but got enticed by my sweets. :D) and realising they were more well-travelled than i do. though some had some sort of attitude problems but it wasnt too bad. they kinda got more obedient cuz i was feeding them with sweets. hehe. got to know my v1 chinhao better. he's another big glutton along with mervyn! always hungry. haha. it started smoothly with us getting to the stations quickly. but we were damn suay to get changi chapel-botanic gardens combo. took us three hours in total and we didn't even get to reach the botanic gardens. bleah. at least we managed to get back on time!

campfire was alright. and i think my patrol's skit was one of the funniest. hehe. joisah looked so cute when he acted as the innocent kid who thought that the fly whose wings, legs and head got plucked out was a raisin! hehe. and then it was e cubs investiture.

after that it's e world scout badge test for the v1s. ate some nice food as we ironed and sewed badges on the uniforms. that took like nearly the whole night. then had exco elections where grace became the interim chairlady. built the flag mast and thankfully some scouts helped out. like alastair who helped us to build for the whole night, cuz all e ventures except me fell asleep, and there were also weihao david.wong who did the finishing touches to the flag mast.

then it was the rehearsals for the investiture. me minqi siewjing were the colours party (me e prep pennant, minqi the troop flag and siewjing the unit flag). did okay-ly, even though there was a glitch when i rose the prep pennant for the first time. opps. had scouts investiture too. then took group photo! then it was the great clearing up, which was as hiong as last year, cuz there was simply too many barang barang to do. after all, we had e entire scout group down, from the cubs to the guild (should be eh?).

back at sajs, after some simple packing up, we had the prize ceremony for the amazing race. Big Mac got second! yay. then had debrief for the entire ventures where we reflected on the good and bad points of camp. got the group photo which david elizabeth rushed out while we were cleaning up. went to macs with shaun mervyn eugenia chinhao derrick while waiting for my dad to drive me home. met some fellow saints. and i got my wish of eating Long John Silvers! (:

and this is the first time that i've slept through more than 12hours after my first asjab camp when i was sec1. i was using the laptop until like 5pm and i decided i need to sleep. then i slept until like 9 this morning. probably because i've only slept for like 4hours in total during the entire camp. i was right that i would sleep for less than 10hours for the camp after all. =p

basically, this camp gave me fond memories which i would always remember, just like how Group Camp 2006 has given me (i regretted not being able to attend e entire camp), and i want to come back for group camp'08 and the many more camps to come. cuz i love this cosy feeling of being with the entire scout group and not just with my fellow ventures. cuz there's always some void when you're not with the entire huge family. but nevertheless, our bonds would still stay, just like this camp's theme - One Family Unbroken.

the v1s are funnay people. like the two boys chinhao derrick who love to blow out my candle during the candlefight and bullying me other occasions, mervyn whom i bully and who bullies me back, eugenia whom i shared the common interest of the cute cub scouts and grace who's damn zai with using e GPS machine and still came for the entire camp even though she was feeling kinda sick. they are amazing. and i'm glad that i'm in the same group with almost all of them. (:

(mervyn me eugenia. one of e few people not sleeping on the bus, other than e rovers. and i'm wearing the Shrek ears actually. =p)

and my fellow v2s. we're like under constant pressure to execute the plans properly and hafta handle the kids along with the rovers while we bring them out for amazing race. but we had fun on the dragonboat and from the lil' things. love the girls the most! ms LEEXX who were very helpful while we were at pulau ubin and who slogged her heart out doing the proposal and doing so many things by herself, and being one of the two logistics ic for the first two days. you are the SUPERWOMAN! :D belynda who helped us got SOOOOO many things before coming over on wednesday. without her many things wouldnt have been done. like the wonderful iron and the hidden package under the digestive biscuits and the v1 contacts. YOU ROCK! :D plus minqi siewjing who are e dedicated food ics who ensured that we are fed properly. even though they were part of a planning committee for the first time, i would say they had done it pretty well. good job girls. (:

and the boys. alfred who was under the massive pressure along with xiuxian to plan e whole thing and taking over shaun as the commander for the investiture and one of e campfire emcees. even though he's very tired, he still pressed on. like what he said during the second night's reflections, it's only a matter of your choice whether you would enjoy yourself during the activities. shaun who made me really reflect about the role and attitude that i'm supposed to take on during the camp. he's truly an inspiring chairman, a feature whom david said a chairman should have. i'm glad that he has become the chairman after all, though last year i thought he was better off being the vice-chairman. yubin the treasurer who did a lot of saikang handling the logistics along with xiuxian. like shaun, i was also very glad that he has joined the exco as the treasurer this year, cuz he has the commitment and passion to do so. as for luke, even though i didn't have much to say, but i would still thank him for trying to keep me awake by irritating me constantly on the third night, and doing the saikang work of contacting the v1s. and i dun get angry easily after all you know. ha.

for the rovers, thanks to david.wong steph.bay who were with us throughout the whole camp, especially david.wong who overlooked the whole event and like to suan us sometimes. felt kinda humourous when i was fast-marching with him as we headed for the jetty. like lil' kids trying to compete. ha. and tying the flag mast along with me weihao alastair while the other ventures fell asleep at around 4am in the morning. and kenneth who was my patrol leader at camp christine. helped to take care of the kids and came up with the hilarous skit for the cubs and scouts to perform during campfire. the v3s steph.seow elizabeth weishan who gave helpful comments through the emails during the planning stage. and the other rovers like clement who taught me yubin shaun alfred about some knots required to build the flag mast before we headed for camp and letting me get a cold drink during the second night.

this project was e biggest project i've ever undertaken and took the most amount of timing planning. my email inbox's messages expanded from like 700 messages to 850 over messages in the short span of 3weeks or so. and most of the emails are sent at night, meaning we had stayed up late at night to do the ammendments etc. not to mention the meetings that we had to settle certain issues. and running all over the place to locate the things that we would need for the camp. it's very tiring, but it made us get to know each other better.

Venturing was something that i've never thought of before going for last year's VOPF, and it gave me mixed feelings throughout this one year. it's coming to an end soon, and i'm glad that it's ending off on a happy note. whether i'm coming back next year as a rover remains a decision yet unknown, and i hope that i wouldn't be regretting it.

Venturing is what you make it to be.

10:20 AM