First time out

到头来还是家最重要，最温暖。

Brother on the ferry towards Tekong last Thursday

Last night Brother booked out from camp for the first time since he first enlisted a week ago. It's only a week for him because Good Friday fell nicely in the middle of his initial 2 weeks period, so he came home after 1 week, but only for 1 day.

He took the taxi home since my father was working that evening and when we heard his voice at the door, I abandoned my computer with anime D. Gray Man still playing on my browser (damn, I had to replay it after that), grabbed my camera, decided it would take too long to load, then grabbed my phone instead and got out of the room. Olivia was already there.

We found him at the door in full uniform. I realized if it's your own brother, it really is nothing seeing him in uniform. Well, except for feeling a little touched and glad about seeing him again. I stopped him at the door and wanted to take a picture of him, to commemorate the first time ever he came home from the army. So he was grinning sheepishly at the camera. His girlfriend, Xiao Yun, was at the door with him. Think she went to Pasir Ris Bus Interchange to meet him.

Mum's hand pushing his hand off as he embarrassingly rubbed his head

The moment he took off his cap, he was saying he looked like an egghead and I immediately agreed. His body looked too big while his head looked too small. According to the father, most guys look like that when dressed in that uniform without his cap or hair. He looked ok once he was dressed in his normal clothes, though.

Olivia gave him a card she had made and a card she had bought. On the card says "Welcome home!", "I missed you!" and "Don't leave me again!" I think brother was touched. I groaned and told her not to write such mushy stuff =P

I was standing at the kitchen door, taking this picture and asking him about stuff in the army, like how his bunk mates are, what they did etc. He said those in his platoon aren't only JC students but also from polytechnic and other places. And boy, do the people there know how to swear!

Wah lao, a lot of bad words lah! All better than me!

I laughed at that. It was one thing to know that it was that way inside based on what your male friends tell you, but it was another hearing it from your brother's mouth.

I asked if there were water parades, he said yes and demonstrated how it was with the commands and having to recite the 7 what of the SAF what before drinking. He also said there were a lot of lectures to attend and it was really boring. He would fall asleep during the lectures. Once, his friend fell asleep and had drool dripping out of his mouth.

That aside, amazingly in his 7 days there, he never learned how to wash anything with washing powder. The only thing he washed was the brown shirt they had to wear in camp. So when he came home, he took out a ziplock bag with 4 pieces of underwear inside and asked me how to wash them. I looked at him in disbelief then instructed him step-by-step. No way was I going to touch those 4 pieces of cloth. And throughout his 7 days there, he never once washed his number 4 though he has worn it for marching several times. Either he don't perspire much, the uniform don't absorb perspiration that easily or they didn't wear it a lot of times because I sniffed it (gingerly) and found there to be no smell.

He also said he didn't want to wash because it was very difficult to fold up the sleeve. Whatever.

Anyway his girlfriend wanted to stay the night. I don't know who said she is to sleep in brother's room but my mother did not allow and said she is to sleep in my room if she is staying overnight. Mum came over to my room to tell me and mouthed to me "what if they make love, then how?" I rolled my eyes. As long as she doesn't get pregnant... In the end perhaps her father did not allow it so she went home.

Brother spent the rest of his time on the computer and phone that night, I suppose satisfying that Internet and phone craving. Then he went to bed nearing 12 midnight, earlier than usual.

This evening he had to go back in again and we sent him to the interchange, the entire family including Xiao Yun.

BOY, WERE THERE A LOT OF MEN-IN-GREEN THERE!!! As long as it's not my brother, I am happy looking at them all. Imagine a whole lot of them, all in Smart 4, all that testosterone! I could not help but grin a little to myself. I walked through a whole crowd of them! Left, right, front and back, I was surrounded by green! It was like a dream come true.

So we waited with him until one of his platoon mates came to tap on his shoulder to tell him they had to gather. I did not understand why all other platoons were standing in the interchange under light while his had to gather beside the interchange, on the grass patch, in the dark. Maybe they wanted to demonstrate the effectiveness of the colour of the uniform because I sure could not see who was who, especially since all of them had eggheads.

Olivia just started waving randomly to the group where we were standing, a distance away. Her rationale was that he would see us and wave back, and he actually did do that. Only that several others also started staring at us wondering why the kid was constantly waving at them. Xiao Yun also waved a couple of times.

He soon got on the bus and that was about when my father realized brother did not tell us what platoon he was from. So he's back there on the island, stuck for the next 7 days.