henry

My first day in camp

After 3 months of basic military training, I was send to the School of Accountancy to be trained in my vocation as a pay clerk. There were only 5 national servicemen, the rest were lady trainees. Ladies were not required by the constitution to serve in the army. They were there to make a carrer out of it. All of them were friendly and in no times we found ourselves going out together and having sing-along-sessions. On the 6th weeks, we were posted out and were waiting for personnels from our respective camps to pick us up.

On my way to the camp in a Land Rover, the corporal said that there were some similarities in my name and one of his army buddies who had just left after fulfilling his 2 years of national service. He was none other than my elder brother. When I reached the camp, the corporal introduced me to the unit's second-in-command, a Captain. I saluted and wished him good-morning. Upon learning of my sibling, he was very happy, he said "so, you are his brother...and I can see that you are a marksman. Tomorrow you follow me go shooting, I take rifle no 1, you take rifle no. 2." Under the military laws, all marksmen were presented with a badge, two rifles crossing, to be worn on the left side of the sleeves at all times and he spotted it. I was introduced to the rest of the personnels. They welcomed me with open hearts. My brother's army buddies were now all my buddies. Instincts told me that my army life thereafter would be a breeze. The next day, I went to withdraw my rifle for shooting practices. I requested for rifle no. 2. The person-in-charge said, "no, no, no! rifle no 1 to 20 are all reserved for army officers."  I told him it was the Captain's instructions. After much confirmation, he handed me the rifle, No 2.  I was the envies of everyone in the camp. Even army officers posed this question to me, "how you managed to get rifle no. 2?"
We went to the shooting range, firing boxes after boxes of bullets. Shooting was fun but not the cleaning up of rifle. During my recruit days, used to be yelled at by the coporals, "there's a big elephant inside the barrel, do you want to drop 20? (meaning 20 push-ups as punishment). To spare the agony to rid the barrel of carbons, I consulted the person in-charge of rifles. He told me to do a casual cleaning and to fill the barrel with lots of oil. We were taking part in an island-wide shooting competition, pitting our skills against other camps. It was divided into 2 groups. Group 1 were for top military units like the commandos. We were in Group 2 .

After months of shooting practices, our efforts were paid off. We emerged the Champion.