~JcZw

Shall do a quick one before I go back and chiong for chemistry... Didn't know that being a science student would be so abnormally busy...

Refer to Si Hui and Jiayan's blog, they talk roughly about the same thing as mine, and yes, I am the last one to blog about yesterday...

The three of us got our sergeant rank yesterday in a four hour ceremony at temasek sec. Actually 2 hours, but they lagged a long long time and exploited our cadets doing manual labour (At least in fencing, you get paid $300). Started with Jiayan telling me to take the wrong bus, so I took the wrong bus to a junction, mistook the community centre for TMS and jumped off. Confronted with a cross junction, I had 3 roads to take. I walked the correct route, thought i was going in the wrong direction, walked to the wrong one found myself nearing AHS, turned back, walked the perpendicular route, and generally by the time I reached TMS i was hot (remember my specific heat capacity) and ready to spontaneously combust. Changing into that waxy horrow misnamed a full uniform while one's body temperature is above 36.9 deg C is definitely not something that the average person enjoys.

Ceremony went as planned... i admit that I was very nervous of fouling up when I went to take my insignia n cert... but instinct from 4 years kicked in and everything went alright... I wonder if Mr David Cheng noticed my hand was shaking... Thanks to our cadets n NCOs for cheering =) I wonder if the audience noticed 2 Jonathan Chans were announced back to back heheheh... And I wonder if they knew the shorter one was the older one...

You are hereby promoted to the rank of Sergeant with the effect from the 1st August 2005

You will at all times be loyal, discharge your duty dilligently and serve honourably in your new ranks.

I half expected it to continue "or face execution". Shades of Stalin

Reception was... foody... When will HQ learn that the only was to NOT have excess food is to NOT ORDER so much food? Well, it was edible, actually quite okay lar... as can be expected of mass produced catered food. After that we escaped to help carry chairs for the two reasons, one, to help the cadets (1 for all, all for 1... just cos we're no longer in AHS doesn't mean we don't carry on tradition), second, cos HQ is notorious for asking people hanging around to help finish food, and I didn't want to eat more mee siam than i wanted.

Then, of course, came the exciting part as we departed from the school.

Honestly, it didn't occur to me that I had to press the button on the traffic light. Just thought it was lagging for a long time... I was just staring at the road entertaining thoughts (how ironic), that if there was an RTA, there wouldn't be shortage of first aiders.

Crossed the road, and Jiayan was just asking for 55 cents and I was bracing for the rush onto the bus which appeared to be potentially crowded when there was the shriek of metal on metal, the howl of rubber against asphalt as the car lit up its brakes. The blur of the white car rushing past coincided with another blur of a St. John cadet rushing across the road. The much-cliched "sickening thump of metal against flesh" was stunning. You read about accidents in the papers, but you never think you'll get to see one.

Especially when the car took the cadet in the pelvis and flung him in the air, describing a lateral line across the road, head first, with the elegance of a goalkeeper diving for a ball, before he landed just in front of the pavement, and slid on his shoulder to rest on the road side

Especially when I recognized Jun Hao from Squad 3.

For all the training they give you in st. john, when such a thing happens you don't think calmly. None of us can remember how we covered the 7 meters or so from the bus stop to him. I must have dropped my wallet cos I found it lying on the floor later on. In a blur of motion and loud noises from myself, the road and the other SJ members, I only can remember asking him whether he could move his legs, and if he could, if he could move from the road in case the accident was compounded. I was preparing for fractures, blood, etc. It didn't seem possible that the human body could take congress with such kinetic energy and emerge unscathed. But thank God, he was alright.

The sole of his shoe was tore almost completely off, as was his toe nail. His arms contained numerous scratches and his pelvis must have sustained an awful contusion, but he was alive and conscious. I shudder to think of what it would have been if he had frozen as the car roared towards him, or if he had landed on his head. His guardian angel must have been working overtime.

Really, its little things like that that make you appreciate life. That could have happened to me, to Jiayan, Si hui, anyone else that had been there. It could have happened to anyone. And no guarantees the next person would be lucky.

Oh well. Anyway senior meeting... no comment. I hate bureaucracy =)

Yup, as for the reader.

If you're in VJ, you ought to go back and study chem (thats where i'm going)
If you're a sec4, go study for prelims
If you're sec3 or below.... alright, you can tag =)

Fine, anyone can tag, alright?

hahaha

right... chemchemchemchem