My defining moment.
Could a moment fully define my whole BMT experience? Every experience is made up of so many events, so many memories that will eventually lead up to that point in your life where it gets so special, where one will remember for the rest of their lives. Thus, my defining moment was the day I stepped into Tekong, yet littered with so many other memories picked up along my BMT journey.
On 7 May 2013, it was the day that a whole new season of life begun for me. I personally believe that army will be more than just a chapter in my life because when BMT ends, it would be the end of a chapter in this new season for me. On that day, when I first took my step into Pulau Tekong, it was a step into uncertainty, of change, a step out of my comfort zone. A step that I would have preferred not to make.
Walking up the flight of stairs, surrendering my pink IC, it all happened too fast. It had not yet impacted me the severity of the act. That when I handed in my pink IC, I had pledge my allegiance to this country. This country called Singapore by others around the world, but a country I call home. However, at the moment, I still looked at myself as a civilian, walked like one, treated myself as one. My identity was of a civilian, and it had not yet been changed.
What changed my identity, what made me look at myself in the mirror and realize that 7 May 2013 had truly happened and all this was not just a nightmare, was the day I cut my hair. Having been living with my trademark long fringe since I was even in Primary school, it had become a part of me. As I walked into Pulau Tekong, I was still with my long, floppy fringe. I was still me, I was still Yue Seng. However, when the lady shaved me bald, when I felt my hair departing away from my scalp, when I saw bit of bit my hair drop onto the ground, my precious hair leaving me. There was aching in my heart because I did treasure my hair, and when it was shaved off, I lost something. I had lost a part of me. That made me wake up to reality, and the life of being a soldier. A life of sacrifices.
Not being able to sleep as long as I like, not being able to do whatever I would like when I like, to find myself having to undergo training, perspiring so much, having to much from place to place and being rushed constantly throughout the whole day.Looking at it from a neutral perspective, these sacrifices were all small things. But the biggest sacrifice I probably have made or been forced to make was time. Time that I could have spend with people that mean a lot to me, the inability to be physically be there for them. But as the saying goes, "No pain, no gain."
Therefore, my defining moment for BMT, would be the day it first began for me. But my defining moment to be soldier would be that moment I lost my trademark fringe and beloved hair.
