Don't Close Your Eyes

		Hello, World. ♥; JANICE Ahbai/Lab/Abaky(tard) & Living life on the edge Facebook

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Spectacular. Every time I look back at my latest post, I'd feel overwhelmingly lost in thoughts. It's pretty stunning how I could witness myself change within a short span of four months. Will exclude the redundant rants about school and all, so here's sharing with you a little bit (actually nearly everything, sorta a day-by-day review) of my takeaways from OCIP Laos. ;) I was in Laos yesterday/two days ago (I actually took two days to post this). Felt like so long ago. :( Oh well. Here goes. Two nights ago while doing the final reflections for the OCIP Trip, I thought about a lot of stuff. Looked back at why I joined OCIP Laos in the first place; there wasn't anybody I knew from my class or CCA. Could've expected the loneliness, but still I went ahead with it boldly. So... Jay was right. I was brave and the courage paid off. At the start of the trip we were asked to write a letter to ourselves. The typical stuff you do "for optimum learning experience" and a certain form of "mind-blowing ecstasy" you get when got to feel exactly like a few days ago. If I could, I'd really want to keep it confidential, but for the sake of the remembrance of this post ten years down the road, I shall type it out word for word. I haven't read this slip of paper until now. To Janice :) Hi. You are a daredevil. You have lived the past 10 days and come out of it alive! You never seem to have such guts, but you did it! :) I hope you have learn how not to take things back in Singapore for granted. Like clean water, good sleeping environments, friends, family, everything. These are completely absent here in Laos, but this should be taken as a great experience that you will remember for life. You're going to turn eighteen soon, and what defines an adult should define you. So I hope you have become more articulate and proactive in handling matters. You started off afraid. Afraid because there isn't anyone you know on this OCIP trip. Whatever made you choose to take on this challenge, good for you. But I hope you have made valuable friendships along the way. Remember to thank your room mate for accompanying you on this journey! By the end of this trip, you should be open to making new acquaintances! To end this on a high note, remember who you have helped and more importantly, who have helped you. In the end, the outcome might still be that you have received more help than you gave. A noteworthy achievement unlocked: living without a phone (not literally, but rather, without internet and texts). Then again, just count the number of texts you received and sent in the course of 10 days! GG. But it makes you feel better. So who did you miss? ;) Well. You'd say you would never want to go for OCIP ever again. I'd say, after 10 days, we'll see! :) From, Janice As retarded as it sounds, those were truly how I felt before embarking on this journey. DAY 2 I thought it could be the start of something new (cliché). Literally. There were all sorts of surprises. Kinder surprise! :) So the first thing in the morning I bathed. Supposedly there was a heater, but the heater failed on me. Freezing cold. Wouldn't have bathed in cold water in Singapore if unnecessary. Breakfast was unexpectedly inadequate. All we had was bread and butter/jam and Milo. Come to think of it, I shouldn't have set high expectations of the Lodge's food; I eat such breakfast at home too okay! So I was used to it. The ride to Na'ang Village was awesome. I love bumpy rides, but nothing beat my discovery of the metal raft that could hold cars. When we finally arrived at the village, I felt that it was a rather pleasant sight at first. Very natural, nothing much man-made. Then it dawned on me that we'd have to last for the next 7 days. The first daunting task was bathing. We had to share a bathroom/toilet which was dark and had mosquitoes. Well water, COLD water, using a scoop instead of a shower head, dirty floor. The first bath was really... I couldn't imagine myself doing so for the next few days. Education committee had the honour to start the washing of dishes on the first day of our stay at the village, so that was what we did after dinner. It was really crazy having to wash dishes for 29 people, considering the fact that I haven't even done so for the 7 people at home. We had an oily time complaining about how the stuff from the chicken and all could serve as moisturiser. It almost seemed an impossible feat. Debrief and facilitation was friendly because our committee was really high. I was hoping that making meals the next day would be a better experience. DAY 3 Today we officially started off our service programme at the school in Na'ang Village and also started mural painting. It was boring at the start when the Publicity Committee was doing the preparation work, but towards the end, more or less everyone was involved. There were also a few pretty young girls at the door watching us start work. They gave me origami folded hearts and some delicate plants. ^^ So sweet. My first day of teaching the Primary 4.2 class at Na'ang Primary School was a horrifying experience. The class had weird dynamics; some of the boys were rather rowdy and uncooperative, while the rest of the class, especially the girls, was very quiet and not participative. Our planned lessons spanned a mere... one hour (?) before we ran our of things to teach. Games were quite chaotic as well. We decided later that we did a terrible job. I wasn't "loud" and "firm" enough according to Glenn (in my reflection booklet I wrote "compared to Glenn"). See why? During dinner time I sat with a whole table of guys and Joachim. We played "I Have Never" to clear the food. And during facilitation time we played an interesting and thought-provoking game called "____________ to Citizenship". Basically the rules of the game are as follows: Tap you once: Repeat all the rules of the game Tap you twice: Squat on one leg Tap you three times: Return to your original position Tap you four times: Do whatever you want So the gamemaster, Mr. Li, kicked off the game. I didn't know what it was about, until Tong Wei instructed the person who got tapped four times to save all the rest who were painfully reciting the rules of the game and squatting on one leg. The game went on and we had two rounds. The second round where we had our eyes closed ended when Charmaine, who was tapped four times, asked for the game to stop. Mr. Li said it was the most powerful way to use the power that he had ever seen for the 3 years he played this game. That was really clever. :) He then got us to think about the rationale behind the game -- what type of citizens were there, and what they represented, how people in power should handle power. Something like... a good leader does things even when others are not looking. So it's a game of integrity and the test of a person's character and so on. Really really awesome. DAY 4 More mural painting and teaching. Today, our mural painting took flight when we added colours at the different individual panels where we are supposed to include our paintings. My personal favourite was the "I (heart) Laos" thingy done by Yirong. I did the mixing of green paint, which was pretty screwed up because it didn't turn out the same colour before (we ran out of blue paint). After lunch, we went to have lessons again with the class. Honestly, by that time, I had already developed some sort of phobia of the teaching, for fear that it might fail terribly again. Somehow I was really afraid of Glenn. He looks really stern and all so... Hmmm. It went wayyyyyyyyyyyy better than the day before; most of the stuff was under control, and the children seemed to learn new things (I hope). I had lots of fun interacting with my own small group of boys at the front of the class. I found out that Pyan was a really smart boy who's just mischievous, and Maet who sat beside Pyan was slightly slower and was really fond of copying his table partner's work. Oh well... The girls are less competent. I hope I could at least get the children to spell properly? Dinner was slightly awkward at the start with Gladys, Jia Wen, Jay, Christopher and Charmaine, because I kinda like intruded into their Games Committee and exclusive clan? We played 终极密码 to clear the 茶叶蛋 gravy. Good riddance. It was really salty. Basket-weaving at night. I concede defeat. No good at finding patterns and no patience to weave and all. Ughhhhhhhh. It was difficult to keep up with the different patterns. Each time I try, the teacher (ah-chan) would just undo and redo for me. Nicole and I were struggling hard, but Glenn the "modern man" managed to show off his skills and win the appraisal of even the villagers! :) DAY 5 Day 5 is a relieving day. The murals were beginning to take form -- the details were done up and all that's left to be done is the touch-up. It could be because of the masterplan that the Pubs Comm came up with, and everyone was efficient since they had things to do. I remembered being really excited to see the turn-out. The last day of lessons. Honestly, I did enjoy teaching, but every time I think of stepping into the classroom and facing the students, I get anxious. It's getting better, but I still fear. I loved interacting with the children, but it kinda sucks when I don't understand what they are asking about. I'm also beginning to be good at guessing what they were trying to tell me. Quite sad to leave the class, especially Pyan and the cute, pretty ladies of the front rows. Have I been neglecting the back part of the class? Took some photos. When we gave out sharpeners, an entire flock came swarming towards me. Was really taken aback but then again, I could understand why. We cleared our logistics for all the lessons and the teachers are like playing five stones...? It's only today that I came to realise that the teacher chaperones are really nice people! One thing for sure -- I'd miss the kids. DAY 6 Today, Marcus and I were the team leaders, which I have already anticipated somewhat. Hmmm. Today we finished the mural painting, and it turned out magnificent, despite all the last minute touch-ups that we had to do. It was messy, dirty and gross, but it was all worth it. :) Took lots of photos with the completed wall painting. So after lunch, we had a telematch thingy with the children. It was rather chaotic at the start, but a while later everything was under control. It all went smoothly until it became so scorching hot that we had to return to the classes. So I was in the Dance station, and gotta admit, Jay dances pretty well! Exact words I wrote in my reflections booklet: He also has strength and passion to keep the attention of the little children. Cool. Back in the classrooms, the children were really bored and tired so we played ball and sang to them. That marked the last day with the kids in school. Later, we toured the village and went to visit the farm, which we didn't get to do farming activities at. At night, we continued to weave baskets. I was rather proud to be able to at least catch up and focus on making them. ;) So here's a bit on my experience of being team leader for the day. At the start I wasn't too sure about what being a leader entails, despite having already been briefed by Chris and Charmaine, so I thought things would just go along. Had to keep mental notes of timings and all. So during standby, it was unnerving because it always seemed as though we missed out some minuscule detail. Mr. Li really had quite a lot of expectations. Like some military training thingy. So during mural painting, we didn't manage to keep track of people who came and left. And yes, water parade. My failed decision to ignore Mr. Li's hints and went on with my own thing. Which was really dumb looking back at it now. On the whole, I was really glad I didn't have to do this alone, and also learn important lessons on leadership. Day well-spent. Second last day at Na'ang Village. Will most definitely miss the cool baths. DAY 7 Today's activities were entirely different. In the morning, our whole team went on a tuk-tuk ride for caving. So my expectations of a cave was that it would be suitable for caving. Like... people could walk around rather comfortably in it, just that there'd be some weird insects or animals in it. Well, this experience sure showed me the vengeance of a 2,000-year-old cave. The cave was dark, damp, dirty, humid, muddy, and not even cold. There was this stretch that we even had to duck-walk. It was then when I finally saw the good of being short. So when we left, mud piled up under our shoes. But it was a rare experience. :) I thought this was the most tiring and physically strenuous activity of the whole trip. Later on, we had nothing much to do, so we started allocating work for preparation of dinner and the performance. Kinda sad that we didn't manage to go farming, because I really wanted to try it out. So for the performance, I was again in the dance thingy. At first I thought it was going to be horrible, but turns out everyone enjoyed learning Gangnam Style from Jay. :) The preparation of the main dishes for dinner was stalled because the transportation of the chicken (20kg worth!) and fish meat was delayed on their way from Vientiane. It was chaotic and disorganised during the preparation and everyone seemed quite flustered (teacher chaperones included). When we finally started the dinner with the ceremony, I was rather moved by the effort that the villagers put in for this event. The white bands that they prepared, although unsophisticated and ordinary, actually encompassed the many well wishes for Laos and Singapore. I thought it signified ties and friendship. I was touched by the fact that even the children I didn't teach greeted me with a warm smile and brought the strings to tie on my wrist. Also, through this, I discovered quite a lot about their culture; the younger generation are expected to crouch and bend down before walking in front of village elders who were seated down. The performance was really heart-warming in my opinion. I was quite sure that the villagers didn't really understand the meanings behind the songs, but since I do, I felt that they were really apt for the occasion. Everyone was part of the celebration and we all had fun in one way or another. Even the teacher chaperones performed. ;) It felt just like campfire night all over again. Dinner was slightly awkward but all was fine, except when a toad bumped into Marissa's butt. Looking back at the past few days, apart from the wonder I got from realising that I actually "survived" and even enjoyed myself whole-heartedly, I also wonder how I would describe my experience to others. Bitter-sweet? One-of-a-kind? Mind-blowing? Precious. Extraordinary. DAY 8 In the morning, we had our last breakfast at Na'ang Village. I'd miss eating instant noodles daily. Then it was all the packing and getting ready to leave. It was really heart-wrenching seeing the kids by the windows watching you do stuff, then realising that you're never going to have that again. So we had our final standbys at the village, and left in our vans. I can't believe I'd actually say this, but I really was crying at the start of the return journey. Just thoughts and emotions... but powerful enough. It doesn't make sense when every song played just doesn't seem right. Reality sucks. And the reality that dawned on me is that we'd lead our lives as per normal again when we get back. Thoughts of this trip all thrown at the back of my mind. At that point in time, I was determined to place this trip somewhere accessible that I can look back at everyday, and remind myself of how fortunate I am and so on. I told myself I'll remember each and every single face that I've known and seen. So back at Vientiane, we took a tour at this temple-cum-museum that was apparently a famous landmark in Laos. I'm not really sure what it is, but all I know is that it had four corners, and all four corners looked somewhat the same. One thing I realised about artefacts in Laos -- they are not enclosed in glass cases like in Singapore and other countries. They were just left lying on the ground. So I thought maybe the Laotians were really civilised. Later on, I was surprised when we drove into this Ministry of Health (?) place? Well, but inside was a museum for this organisation COPE, which helped to make the lives of post-war victims better via the provision of prosthetic gears. Saw many life-like bombs that were now artefacts. Learnt quite a lot of stuff like: 1. Laos was amongst the most heavily bombed countries during the Indochina war. 2. 30% of the bombs remain undetonated. 3. 40% who died in the war are children (?) Okay you get where I'm coming from. We watched a 20-minute long video as a team. I thought it was painful to witness. We've heard many war stories and the sufferings that came along with it, but up close and personal, when you're in a foreign land, these stories tend to appeal to your compassion more than when you were back at home. I still don't know what UXO is. Shopped at Talat Sao Market for a while. My van group (consisting of Xun Yuan, Marcus, Zhaoru, Chris, Jia Wen, Alisa, Marissa, Ray Yueh and myself) was a non-shoppers team. So along with Ms Ong, we walked around a bit, found nothing to buy, and then proceeded to a café to have a drink. I ordered Iced Chocolate Peppermint. Tasted okay. Ms Ong's iced chocolate tasted like chocolate water according to her. The best drink was Tommy's Soda Espresso. How on the Almighty Earth did that drink even exist? It sounded disgusting, but I gotta admit, it tasted unique, but certainly not good for drinking. At night, we had this... Seoul Garden dinner. The Laotian version. ;) It was like barbecue, and so we had meat and all. Interesting, but I didn't feel like eating much. I realised that I didn't have much to talk about to people on the trip. Like... I didn't know a lot of people, so I wouldn't know who exactly they were talking about. Nonetheless, I preferred listening to speaking, so then again... I had a reasonably good time with Yirong, Xun Yuan, Marcus and Li Yi during dinner time. At night, we went to a night market. It was decent and up to expectations. Felt like Bugis Street in Singapore. So what we did was to move as the "van groups" and try to haggle our way through if we had items to purchase. Yup. At night back at the lodge, we were asked to draw the social trees of Singapore and Laos and to compare them. The activity was... okay but considering the fact that all of us were literally looking dead... Hmmm. We went to Florence's room at night to watch The Voice. DAY 9 A day of short-lived happiness. Spent the morning at Talat Sao Market again, frantically trying to find things to buy but to no avail. Well at least it was better than the previous day. We had lunch at the mall's food court. It was a refreshing experience having such a great variety of foreign food. I kept to something safe. After lunch, we packed up again and departed for Wattay Airport, and finally touched down at 1937 in Singapore. ---------------- I've decided to keep this segment separate from the day-by-day reflections. So on the plane I had a good personal time thinking. At least I thought I would have. I was sitting alone by the window. I thought I would have a good three hours to sleep or something. Later Oxy and Jay asked if we wanted to move to the back of the plane. Surprisingly, it was quite empty and oxy kept saying that Lao Airlines would go bankrupt. Well... we started off playing Monopoly Deal. Frankly speaking, I wasn't in the mood to play. So... one game and that's it. Shortly after, Jay offered for us to hear some music. So that was what Jay and I did practically for the whole journey. We shared our music preferences and all. He's another person who had such an extensive music library. Cool. We heard random genres from Lady Marmalade to 稻香 to Toy Story soundtracks to opera music to Elton John and finally classical music. He even showed me some tentative songs used for Fac Dance next year, and shared his experiences of planning for FO2. Quite a nice talk. I realised that music forms the bridge between souls. Literally. Like... we heard Chopin, we knew Chopin, we feel Chopin. Nocturne No.2 in E flat. :) Okay whatever... I'm not some music geek. But when it got to the technicalities, that was when I learnt. He played an interesting piece of a flute mimicking the sounds of trains. Technics-wise... Intensive double-tonguing and even the playing of microtones. Impressive. I just felt... enlightened. :) Well. We went on to talking about our futures. Oxy thought we were HTHT-ing, but it was nothing of THAT sort. He talked about him wanting to be a teacher. I told him what I felt. He really could handle young children very well. Hope it didn't sound like I was flattering him, because that was truly what I thought. He was quite mature for a high school boy. No offence. Haha. The first person I saw who was willing to show and share the big picture, aside from just the academics in Hwa Chong. We both acknowledged that academics was important, but there was more to it. When he said something like... if you didn't have goal for the future, even if you scored well for A Levels you'd still just be a smart kid from Hwa Chong. I directed it to myself, though I'm nowhere near smart. I felt it was a decently inspiring talk I haven't had for a very long time, and I'm really thankful for him. I thought I wouldn't find any friend like that in Hwa Chong. It was short-lived but sufficient. At the very least, I was motivated to think about what the future has in store for me (or rather, how I'd want to pave my future). Thanks for the inspiration. :) I really admired Jay's maturity of thoughts and... his commitments to his passions. Music as part of his life and not his life. I sound like a kid learning life lessons. ---------------- So... on the whole. OCIP Laos was an endearing experience. As cliché as it sounds, I really learnt to be appreciative and content. Culture-wise, I learnt that Laos was a conservative nation that held authority in high regard. And many more. It'll sound like a politically-correct piece of reflection for the teacher's reference. Things I really hope I'll be able to keep up are... I don't want the experience to be out of sight, out of mind, and then forgotten; I want to remember OCIP Laos as part of my daily life, and not a way to earn CIP hours or a gateway to making new friends (which are probably popular beliefs of those who want to join OCIPs for these reasons). I want to remember to follow the spirit of the law, and not the word of the law. I still want to look for the purpose in my life (as I have put it three years ago). Hope Jay would turn out as a successful person in any way he defines his success! He deserves to be a winner in life. :) Thank you everyone, all 29 and more of you who've made this trip memorable and insightful for me. Thanks for the memories. Love you all. :)