Aduro - A New Beginning
Day 3
Part 1

Slept at 0500 last night, woke up at 1200 today.
Everyone else had left for Sentosa, except me and half the log crew (grace, shannon and sandra).
I made a check with yuantai whos out in the field. everything seems ok. seems like day 2 - again - only if things happen this time, the log team can't correct it.
Log team said that the stores were not fully taken over. I pray that everything turns out fine.

***

We ordered macs and watched tv, the girls were talking about themselves, i was watching tv.
Jevin called and asked me to prepare the stuff for Talentime. ok.
Suddenly, i feel like a grunt again. Which is not good for the camp, but good for me, cos that's what i'd like to do. What i'm trained to do. Take orders.
Not good for the camp cos there's still a heavy burden on my shoulders. But it seems to me at that moment, the burden seems to have vanished.

Log team as usual, took the extra care to buy stuff like presents ($10 vouchers at some ice cream parlour) for the final giveaway.
I told the log team to buy 24 x 1.5 L bottles of soft drinks, then increased to 30 bottles. For the chillout.
One thing i didn't realise was, we were buying soft drinks for chillout, and not bottled water when we were in phil. Soft drinks, stinging to the taste, ridiculously sweet, do not deplete as fast as bottled drinks.
The log team made jia en ferry all the bottles from clementi to here.

Went back to home, lugged half of my baggage back. Felt a bit sien. The log team was sorting out camp t-shirts to give to the freshies.
Took 29, then the mrt. Two hours of listening to the mp3 player. Not exactly the best way to facilitate a camp. Filled with thoughts of people playing merrily (i hope) in the warm sentosa sandy beaches, as supposedly planned. Somehow, the thoughts were confused with the feelings that i had in Sentosa during the Sheares Hall Exposure Camp. It was fun, i had feelings of pure fun - not those 'fun' that came up in appreciation for effort - sometimes. It was quite rare to have such moments.

The journey took 2 hours, reached home at 4:30 pm. Threw all my clothes on the floor, then loaded up the 1) bottles of alcohol - two bottles of tanduay rum (brought with much difficulty from phil) and and two bottles of Bailey's, one original, one mint, bought on the phil trip.
2) bought a guitar along for talentime, "just in case". Wanted to set off but Mum was home and saw me carrying a guitar on my back and a HUGE duffel bag (with a haversack inside the empty bag) offered to give me a lift. again. was feeling a bit annoyed but took the transport anyway, running out of time.
Stopped at Popular's to buy 3) a "Sorry" card to my SP. long story, that one.

Zoomed back to Aloha Changi, to reach there at 5:30 pm. (Would reach at least 6pm if i had taken public transport, which means i would be hell-bitched by all present and i will never forgive myself).

Bought some ice (found out later, no one used it).

Shannon told me to set up the stage for talentime. Well, ok. Carried the sound equipment all by myself, didn't have much of a choice, as the log people and f&B cell were setting up the place as well, carrying tables, chairs, placing the platters of food, etc. And i was the only guy around.

Took a table for the speakers and placed it behind the "stage" near a drain, and placed all the speakers there. Slung two extensions into chalet D, plugged in all the wires. Set. Sound test.
Shuttled between the performance area, which was in front of the chalets, and the seniors' chalet, a road away, many times, to get stuff.

Didn't have much time. 6:30 the freshies arrived by bus at their chalets. Sometimes i think we shouldn't make their lives so easy. Stepping down the bus, they were greeted by the "stage", an empty space in front of the speakers, which had Kenny G sax blasting from them, and a congregation of about 50 chairs who had mysteriously assembled in front of chalets C and D. And of course, the 5- or 6- course dinner, in front of chalets E and F, of which to whet their appetities.