Monday, October 20, 2008 Y 2:28 PM
There was a NPCC cohesion camp which was held from 10-11 October 2008. The main activities was a trip to the museum( for sec 1 and 3 cadets) on the first day and a CIP on the second day.
First day
We all fall in, and placed our things into a classroom before going to the museum. At the museum, we were given a ticket. We then headed into the Singapore History gallery. It displays the history of Singapore from modern times downwards to 14th century Temasek at the bottom of the structure of the gallery. Before going in, we had to line up and were given a portable hand-held machine, named "Companion". It was like a tour guide in the gallery, and all we had to do was to press the number buttons on the companion (the number were shown in parts of the gallery). By doing so, the "tour guide" in the companion can explain the history and informations of the exhibits shown in the gallery with details. It was quite a nice machine, just that it was a bit bulky.
The Companion
One of the exhibits in the gallery was the famous Singapore Stone . The stone was originally part of a giant boulder, and had inscriptions on it, which until now no one could decipher. The boulder once stood at the mouth of the Singapore River, but was blasted by the British. This Singapore Stone is the only surviving fragment of it, and has a long history behind it. But there was one thing in certain. There was civilisation in Singapore before Sir Stamford Raffles came.
The Singapore Stone.
After the trip to the History gallery, my squadmate and I decided to tour around the whole museum, since there was much time left and had nothing to do. We decided to head into the Living Galleries. It consists of 4 main galleries, namely " Fashion, Food, Photography and Film and Wayang".
The fashion living gallery-
This gallery features the clothes worn by women from the 1950s-1970s. There was also a special section, which had a large display of the different fabrics. We were allowed to touch and feel them. There was also a section which had the many different (but all old) sewing machines, which very few have them now. They were all old but was well preserved, and many old aunties should recognise them.
The Fashion Living Gallery.
Food Living Gallery
After this, we went to the Food Living Gallery, which showcase some of the traditional equipment used by the street hawkers from the 1950s to 1970s, as well as old soft drink bottles. One of the exhibits was the traditional ice-shaving machine( more commonly known as the ice kachang machine). This was a machine used by traditional ice kachang seller to shave ice to make ice kachang for his customer.
The Food Living Gallery.
Photography Living Gallery
The next stop was the Photography Living Gallery. It showcase some of old photographs, cameras and marriage certificate. The old cameras were HUGE, while one was very small, and had gears in it.
One of the old cameras.
Film and Wayang Living Gallery
This is my favourite gallery out of the 4 . By the time we got into the gallery, an old horror movie was being shown. The whole movie was in black and white, meaning that it was quite old. One funny thing about the movie was that it isn't scary at all, maybe due to the time differences between the present and the time the movie was made. One of the machine behind the screens was the old GIGANTIC movie player.
( Sorry but no photo of the Film and Wayang Living Gallery is available)
After the trip to the museum, we had some free time because dinner starts an hour later. During the free time, there were no activities. It was " free and easy". I only had an oreo for dinner, as I wasn't feeling quite well. After dinner, it was games. They played captain ball and soccer, while I just sat around listening to my mp3(again due to me not feeling well).
Just as I was feeling better, they started playing hide and seek(not successful,and I'm going to say the reasons later). I joined in, and being the only sec3 cadet, I was the team leader. Our team was supposed to hide, and the sec1 girls in my team quickly rushed to the classroom. When we were hiding, it was god damned bloody hot. But, after a few minutes, my squadmate sms-ed me to get back to hall. I had bad vibes about this.
They cancelled the game because many of the girls said that they saw a gho*t in a toilet. Just as I heard that, I felt excited, because I'm interested in such stuff. There had been many stories of it in our school,but this one was the first of its kind. Some of my squadmates and I decided to visit those "haunted places" in our school, but didn't eventually.
During the late night, my squadmate (zhiping) and I started to play chinese chess. Each round was about 1hour due to us being tired and some more reasons. In the end, many of the sec3 didn't sleep. Some of them were chatting with the Sirs, and some just sitting around in the classroom listening to the music.
Second day
As usual in this camp, we slacked. But there was one activity which we could not slack- Community Involvement Program (aka CIP). We were to go around some blocks collecting some newspaper for certain charity organisations. It was tiring, but in the end, we all found it fruitful. Our group ( Jet and my group) collected so much newspaper that even though it was just a short walk from the grouping place, we had to use the trolley. Luckily, some kind aunty gave us a bag in which we could put the newspaper in. We unloaded the newspapers in the grouping place and had some cold drink. It WAS VERY NICE. Under a hot Sun doing such job and after which free drink was given is almost heavenly. This was how the camp ended. This was one of the slackiest camp ( most probably because it was to help us de-stress) which I enjoyed very much.
Chia Wen Cong 19/10/2008
The Companion
The Singapore Stone.
The Fashion Living Gallery.
The Food Living Gallery.
One of the old cameras.