Sunday, 13 January 2013

Station 23, Rota 1

I felt like I was a part of the 20 men family.

Some of them looked familiar. I'm pretty sure I've seen them around the neighbourhood in civilian. Most of them are old timers and regulars at the age of 30-40+. Kind of a humbling experience when I saw a dozen of them reporting to work in bicycles. It's an honour to recognize this bunch of noble people being camouflaged by their plain average Joe attire.

Went for 2 enforcement checks at Loyang Industrial. Just amazing to see how they put their game-face on and became professional when interacting with the management and workers there. And after the job's done, they became themselves again, jovial and funny - as hell.

And oh man, the view of the sunset from the station is pulchritudinous-expelliarmusly gorgeous.

We had night lecture - an AAR of orchard flood incident. And I was invited up front to introduce myself. Haha all sorts of funny and some, meaningful questions were being thrown to me. Ah, and the standard green to blue question.

At night, I was kinda nervous to sleep coz I'm the kind of person that needs at least 2 alarm sets beside my ear to wake me up. And sometimes, I'll just ignore it, thinking that they're screaming voices in my dream. I was afraid the bed was too comfy, so I slept at the KC on the floor. :D Anyway, I woke up more than 8 times throughout the night, 3 due to ambulance calls.

At 5.30am, after drinking a milo can - which magically appeared beside me when I woke up (thank you) and after brushing my teeth. There was a fire call - a siren sound that makes us freeze (literally).

"Station 23, Station 23, turnout RT231, RT231."

It was my appliance. Grabbed my uniform and slide down the sliding pole (My course admin said we're banned from the sliding pole during attachment - But really.... xD) Went to the watch room for the call sheet, and I glanced through it - A father reported that his son was high on drugs and threatened to jump from a multi-storey carpark.

Ah, that adrenaline.

But fortunately (or rather unfortunately) the subject couldn't be found anywhere. After 30mins or so of searching and contacting the father, we received the order to return to base. Oh wells.

At 7am, stations around the country conduct drills and scenario exercises. But only unique for Tampines Station, on the saturday morning of every month, they conduct a fire fighting games competition. We're divided into 2 groups to compete against each other on the competency and dexterity of fire fighting and rescue. It was like a relay race, with different stages and stations. There were hydraulic spreader, hose handling, pitching up of ladder, climbing it to another floor, pulling up hoses via ropes, running down staircases with hoses, hose bowling, 20 CA suits pull ups in 2mins, and pin-point target life buoy rescue.

And throughout the race, I was laughing at their funny comments, cheers, jeers, poking fun and sarcasm, vocal mind games.. They're just too funny - but extremely proficient. And wooh my team won.

During the final baris at 8am, I was heavy hearted to leave Rota 1.
Shook hands, and said my final thank you's to them.

One of the enciks came to me and asked for my number.

"What for?"
"Soccer with us at SAFRA when you're free?"

Ah, it wasn't our last goodbye.
Too bad this HazMat station accepts only regular rc.

I'm genuinely thankful to be haaaaadddirr! at Station 23 Rota 1.

Now, 2 weeks of Final Ex. Just 2 weeks.

Just.. 2.. weeks..

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