BTN?

BTN?

So I survived. Yes. 5 days and four nights of expected torture was not realised as it turned out better then what I had in mind.

As for any camp or meeting I have to attend, I normally conduct a private "investigation" on the event so as to prepare myself for the worst (and the best :-) ). I first started by asking the survivors of the BTN camp. I had a few contacts as I had met them during a previous JPA-orgnanised camp. One guy said, the food is horrible and there's a lot of physical activities involved, while another said that she came back with diarrhoea. This clearly wasn't so good as I was fairly fit as I have my daily dose of football, but not to the extent of doing strenuous exercise for 5 days in a row. And about the diarrhoea, I wasn't worried because I knew I had a strong immune system as I survived food away from home for 2 years, and didn't get any stomach upset from eating out.

Our camp was at Meru, Klang. The route to this place was kind of freaky as we knew that civilization was just about to take place in this area.
Evidence :
1.The roads were fairly untouched as the tar was still pitch black.
2. Monkeys considered the dorms their second homes.
3. The houses were still being built in the area. ( so God knows where the people in the area were staying)

The lectures were supposed to cover 4 broad topics; the people, the motherland, the government and sovereignty.

The first speaker on the people was freakin racist. He was saying stuff like the non-malays should be thankful to the malays as we would not be there with our scholarships of not for them and like we owed them a lot. And he said stuff like the nons should help the malays to improve ourselves as it would be better for the economy as a whole.

(Note : You=*****)

I was like "What the ....??" Ok, fine we know that this is your land but this land according to history actually was occupied by the Indians originally and since the malays are living here, they have their rights so why trouble us by asking us to help them improve?
Look, our forefathers came here with nothing but the basic stuff, and we have prospered with what we had at that time. But you guys, who have been here all along as you claim this is your land, so why can't you guys prosper like us? By right, we should be the ones lagging behind in all aspects but sadly it's the OTHER WAY ROUND! I won't go into explaining why but clearly its you who needs to work, and even with the walking stick (government aid for you guys), you still can't prosper. Sigh..

The other lectures were rather neutral..The speakers spoke with the intention of informing rather than criticizing. So I guess most of the speakers were rather well-informed on the crowd the were addressing the matter to ie. A multi-racial crowd. They maintained the objective of their respective lectures.

Then we had the LDK sessions (latihan dalam kumpulan). This was conducted by a facilitator and she guided us through the modules, 8 in total. Met a few new friends, though the girls were a bit too serious as we guys were busy laughing away.

We had 3 physical activities to complete; repelling, flying fox and a 2 km run under 18 minutes.
The first 2 were clearly on facing your fears, while the latter was testing your fitness.
I am scared of heights but I try my best to hide it. So when I got up the 20-metre-tower, my legs were literally shaking as it looked frightening to imagine things that would happen if I was to fall (touch wood!). So then I faced the sky and started descending down the wooden structure.
I kicked against the tower as I released my grip on the string supporting me and I caught it as my feet were about to hit the structure again.And the next minute I heard the guy at the bottom asking me to estimate my distance well as I was about to land.
Hey I made it! My mates told me that I did well compared to the general crowd because it was the first time for the most of them. And it was my third time..heehee..And it's fun!

And I managed to run 2 km in 16 minutes 7 seconds. Glad to pass it.

Made new friends over there. Nice guys, funny guys, weird guys.. You name it. All of them were there. There was this one guy who just couldn't stop talking. Pain in the butt he was in my group as he spoke at the wrong times ie. When we wanted to go for our meal, he would begin his tirade of (yawn) boring questions. And all of us would be like, when would he end? Or how do we stop him?

BTN camp was fun.Period.

Signing off.