So it’s been exactly a month since that devastating April Fools’ Day… the day it was announced to us. It still feels unreal, the thought of her still brings tears to my eyes. I still cannot fathom how such a decision could have been made, despite knowing how many people care about her, though of course given the minimal knowledge we have about what caused it, I cannot pin any blame on her at all. It scares me though, that the memory and images of her are starting to slip away from my mind. I don’t want to forget her but I think I might. Years later, she may probably remain only as a fragment of my memory—a junior who left the world before I did. Or perhaps the pain and sadness that I have felt since the news was made known to us may serve as a constant reminder of her, also as a reminder of how precious life is. This incident—it seems oddly disconcerting to write this off as an “incident”— taught me a lot, about life, about emotions, about helping people.
May Day
The Unit has more or less moved on from then but there are still people struggling to cope. I am glad however, that stronger bonds have developed within and between squads. It is too early to determine whether this has had a net positive or negative impact though but there has definitely been changes to the attitudes of many.
In the past few weeks, it has heartened me how I was able to reach out to more people and make a difference. Taking the foreboding barrier down a level and reaching out via Whatsapp to the cadets was ultimately a good idea. Given the circumstances, I guess it was necessary and I’m glad we made such a decision. Since then, I have found myself in a better position to personally guide and advise some of them, imparting in them the importance of caring for one another, responsibility and integrity. Aunty Shirley was right in that we had to develop a healthy senior-junior relationship because it would be beneficial. Though of course, we still need to maintain a line which cannot be crossed. I do hope we can leave an impact on them as NCOs, just like how our past NCOs left an impact on us, so that they can excel on their own in the near future.
MYEs are coming so quickly. Glad that I am able to revise more than I did for last year’s EOY. Speaking about that, I realised that I really did not perform up to standards for EOY last year. Perhaps it was too many distractions, stress and no clear goal, over-confidence and over-reliance on my own abilities. In any case, I’m trying not to make the same mistakes now. Jiayou!
Oven Thoughts 