Edit 01:
Saturday began early -- for the chance to win $10k "worth of prizes" in the TD car rally. Not sure if it was the dangling carrot that was our main motivation, but I'm certain that my team looked more forward to spending some quality time with each other, doing stuff we would not normally be doing.

There were 5 stations in all, scattered around the island. As each location represented a different aspect of Total Defence, there were 5 different kinds of activities for us to accomplish. There was a bonus activity: a scavenger hunt for various small articles that added to our overall total.

Station 1 was the NTUC in Marine Parade where we had to buy items for a personal emergency kit without exceeding the cost of the $20 voucher found in our clue package. Here, budget shoppers, June and NBS proved their mettle and we got everything on the list, plus the bonus items as well. Theme: Psychological Defence.

The URA Building was our next destination. Basically a scavenger hunt for information scattered around the numerous exhibits and displays on 3 floors dedicated to the organization's PR dept. We didn't do so well here, only completing about half the quiz paper before time ran out. We could have been better organized as a team, but the exercise was somewhat boring anyway. So much for Economic Defence.

The Civil Defence Training Centre was Station 3. Vince and June aced the CPR exercise, while NBS and I amazed our assessors by putting out the fire in our test pan almost at the instant they started their stopwatches. All I was thinking about was that I really needed to use the bathroom -- fast -- and that somehow translated into a more powerful jet from our extinguisher. Ha ha.

Vince and I were almost a complete washout at SAFTI, though. In the indoor electronic shooting range, he scored 2 out of 35 targets with his M16, while I, with a SAW, got absolute zip. I had always wanted to shoot a SAW ("Guns & Ammo" once billed it as the Best Light-Machine Gun in the World a long time ago) so I jumped at the chance. But looking through the apature immediately dried my eyes and my vision went foggy. So I just pointed the weapon at whatever seemed to be moving and randomly sprayed rounds hoping to hit something. Guess that didn't work. No wonder I'm no longer serving NS. Sigh.

The final station was back at the starting point, ECP. Here we, as a team, had to score as many goals as possible in 120 secs. against a lone defender from the junior squad of the SAF S-league soccer team. Despite the lack of experience amongst half our team members, we still managed to score 2 goals, which was ok, I suppose.

All through the route, we stopped to pick up all kinds of rubbish to complete the long list of side-quest items, but we didn't really put our heart and soul into trying to get every single thing on the list, like Anthony's team did. Learning point: photos or reasonable facsimiles of the objects on the list are just as acceptable as the actual objects themselves. Keep that in mind for next year.

No, we didn't win. But we got some nice souvenirs for participating, including a hydration backpack each. Could be useful for 'blading. Maybe if NBS doesn't want hers she can give it to JY?

Celebrated the end of a long day at Swensen's, J8. Phew.
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Woke up at 5am on the floor of the study. Had some pix to upload of Saturday's Total Defence ExplOrally (that's "Explo-rally," not "Expl-orally"), but the day's adventures must have taken quite a toll on me. A short rest to clear my head turned into a 6 hour delta-state affair, in which I had the most bizarre dreams.

Am now famished. Need breakfast. NOW. Pix will follow, perhaps later today.