T H E___B E A U T I F U L___G A M E

Friday, October 12, 2007

this post will be my diary on what happened during the time i was in australia!!!

Ex Kujarra III
Woomera, Australia
26th Sep 07 -- 10th Oct 07
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

26th Sep 07
Will be touching down in Adelaide, Australia in less than an hour time... First time taking a plane... Quite a good experience not to mention got pretty air stewardess... Everyone's pretty excited since we got on the plane... Flight is around 6 hours... There's gonna be another long bus ride later on as well...

Best Fire Unit, here we come!!!

27th Sep 07
Finally reached the town of Woomera after a whole day of bus ride from Adelaide... It was a super long journey with a couple of pit stops in between... First stop was at a petrol kiosk at Port Wakefield where we bought some drinks and some stuffs to eat for breakfast... Next stop was a longer one at Port Augusta where we had our lunch and also did out grocery shopping at a supermarket...

There were plenty of sights along the journey... The landscapes and scenery here is damn beautiful... Saw lots of animals along the journey as well... There were horses, cattles, sheeps and emus...

Reached Woomera at around dinner time... Settled into our rooms and unpacked our stuffs... The rooms pretty good... 3 person sharing one so it ain't that bad... But i don't exactly like my room mates... Well, gotta make do with it...

Will be going to our deployment site tomorrow...

And the weather here feels like as though we are living under a huge air con!!!

27th Sep 07
Second day in Woomera. Went to our deployment site first thing in the morning... The weather was hot but the wind was damn strong until we hardly sweat pushing the equipments out and deploying them... But the strong wind was a bad thing as well... It kept blowing the sand up and onto us until we were breathing sand and getting it in our eyes...

Managed to deploy all the equipments today and ahead of schedule as well... So we came back earlier than expected... But it wasn't a good thing though coz we had to go for a flight run!!! Argh... Can't escape from running even when we are in Woomera... The run was both good and bad... Good as the weather here made you hardly break a sweat when you run... But bad as its been a long time since i ran such a long distance and the dry air here made it hard for one to breath...

It was free and easy after that so we went to the local supermarket to get some more grocery for our stay here and also to start our photo taking frenzy!!!

28th Sep 07
Did our system check for ouur equipments today... Things weren't going very well... There some problems with the guns... I hope it won't hinder our firing or our chances of getting Best Fire Unit would be affected... Hopefully all the faults can be rectified tomorrow!!!

The night sky here is simply magnificent i tell you... Its really like nothing you ever see in Singapore or on Ubin or Tekong... The view is just like seeing those desktop wallpapers face to face... Can only be described with the word Majestic!!!

Weather is damn cold man... The weather here is quite erratic... Hot one day and cold the next... Hope i don't fall sick!!!

29th Sep 07
4th day of preparation... At last gun 2 is up and ready to go!!!

Nothing much today... Pretty much the same things we have been doing for the past few days... Took more photos of the town during our free and easy time in the evening... And even though there is no Singapore Pools for us to bet our soccer matches, there is Australian TAB!!! And the odds are better than sg pools!!! So decided to try my luck on a few matches tonight...

Had a briefing for all the Tracker Operators(TO) tonight on the engaging procedures and how to hit the target more accurately... Well, i agree with what Sgt JunRong said after the briefing... While the guns are shooting, those not doing anything must pray hard!!! Haha...

Dry run day 1 tomorrow...

30th Sep 07
Damn dull day... Waited like the whole day before the NS platoons finished their system checks and dry run passes so that we can take over the system to do our checks and passes...

Our dry run today was in the night... It was pretty much the same as mockup just that this time round, there is a real balloon instead of simulating it...

Tomorrow gonna be a super early day for us as we will be in the first shift... Tomorrow our last day of dry run before live firing commences on Tuesday!!!

And guess what, there is porn or rather mature movies being shown at night on the television!!! Haha...

1st Oct 07
Feeling very sick right now... Having a slight fever and a very bad headache... Just popped 2 panadols to try to ease my pain... Really wrong time to get sick with live firing starting tomorrow...

Went through the dry run today inspite of my condition... Had to as tomorrow the real thing and i have to get myself familiarise with the procedures... Hopefully can recover by tomorrow...

Ain't really confident about tomorrow though... The day target is very small and its very hard to see... So its gonna be quite a challenge... Hope that we can be the first to splash the target tomorrow... All the way for Best Fire Unit!!!

2nd Oct 07
First day of firing and it wasn't very good... Did not splash the target at all... Haiz...

If only gun 1 did not go down coz of that 4 screws that came loose, i think we have about 80% chance of hitting the damn target... Well, tomorrow we will be engaging at night and im determined to bring it down!!!

Seeing the guns fire today was damn awesome... It was even a better sight at night when we can see the bullets fly out of the barrel and into the night sky... Its every gunners dream to see the guns fire and we are the honoured few to be able to witness it... The deafening sound adds to our excitement as well...

3rd Oct 07
Damn man... We were so close to hitting the target today!!! The reports say that we missed the target my a mere 1.4 metres... That's like so close man... If only i had aimed higher... Argh!!!

The pressure was on us as earlier on in the day, C1, the NS platoon took down the first target of K3.... And with our fire unit as well... So we had to do well... But sadly, it was so close yet so far...

Tomorrow gonna be night engagement as well... But it probably won't be me up in the tracker as it's surely gonna be AnnAik's turn to have a crack at taking down the target...

And the weather was freezing cold tonight!!!

4th Oct 07
"This is your exercise commander to FU 2... Target Splashed!!! Congratulations!!!"

WOOHOO!!!! We did it!!! Finally, the target is down, hit by the bullets from our guns!!!

Its really hard to describe the emotions that followed after we saw the bullets hit the target on the daytv screen and the target exploded into flames... The feeling is like... ... scoring in last minute of stoppage time to win the champions league for your team... Yea, something like that... Everyone was simply, elated!!!

Credit goes out to AnnAik for tracking the target and getting it down and lieutenant nicholas was the FCO who pressed the fire button... I knew we would splashed the target... Happy for AnnAik as well as he was under tremendous pressure from the start and when PC said those stuffs, i said to myself that annaik will get the target... And he did!!! Woot!!!

We are now well on track to getting Best Fire Unit!!!

5th Oct 07
Did not get to fire tonight due to bad weather... Can you believe it, bad weather in a desert!!! It was about to rain and the wind was so strong that sandstorms keep forming...

Not firing today means we have to fire on sunday which means our off day is being activated... Meaning our R&R gonna get cut or rather it wasn't even there in the first place... No chance to shop meaning no chance of getting souvenirs for my friends... gonna do what i can to get some stuffs for my friends... Give me half a day enough already!!!

tomorrow gonna be our rest day but there is like nothing to do in this ghost town...

6th Oct 07
Our rest day today... Walked around the town in the morning... Noting much to do here really... There is no shopping centre or any other forms of entertainment in this town... So we pretty much rot in our room the whole day...

Heard some not very good stuffs regarding the best fire unit competition... We are not very happy with what we heard... The truth is out there for everyone to see and by tomorrow, it will be pretty obvious as to who is the best...

4 more days left to spend in Australia... I do miss home though... I missed my family, my friends, the food here and my computer!!!

7th Oct07
A2 splashed the target on their first try with 1 gun and 1 barrel... The firing was delayed for the entire day which sucks... A2 splashing the target means we more or less are the best fire unit unless those cuckoos in the upper management think otherwise...

Packing day tomorrow... Everything got to be done quick so that we can be back in time at the hotel for our post exercise dinner function...

8th Oct 07
Cease everything today... Pushed and packed all the equipments and MI into the containers for it to be shipped back to singapore... Took a short trip to Lake Hart... The lake is now dried up but the view there is magnificent nonetheless...

Then post exercise dinner... Result is out, We are the BEST FIRE UNIT!!! Woohoo... Everyone jumped for joy and hugged one another when the results were announced... Finally, all the hard work that everyone put in and paid dividends... No one can doubt us now... Against all the odds with us being the most junior platoon out there and in the end, We Are The Best!!!

Tomorrow we gonna make our way back to Adelaide where we will stay before flying back to Singapore...

9th Oct 07
Left Woomera at last... Trip to Adelaide was damn long... Stayed at place in Adelaide called Mawson Lake... The place there is damn nice man... I don't mind staying here next time man... and the hotel we are staying in is 4.5 stars!!!

Left half a day when we reached there and we quickly settled down and rushed down to town to whatever shopping we can do... Managed to get some stuffs for my family and friends but not everyone though as there simply wasn't enough time and the shops there all closed at 6pm!!!

Leaving this place tomorrow... Kinda sad that i'm leaving... Wished we could have stayed longer here...

10th Oct 07
Im on the plane back to Singapore now... Will touch down in Singapore in a few hours time... This overseas exercise has really been an eye opener with me... Brought back plenty of experiences... Gonna miss Australia... The weather, the food and the people...

Pics Galore