strange life

Okay, so now I'm a fully fledged rookie firefighter and so far I am still trying to get used to the change.

Many people thinks we just sit in the fire station waiting for an emergency to happen and only then we spring into action. Unfortunately this is a common misunderstanding. Our entire day is regimented. We have a packed schedule for the entire 24 hrs of duty. We check and maintain the equipments, train in the morning, clean up the place, go to the gym, have night lectures...

It's pretty stressful if you ask me especially when you are new. It's even more stressful when your seniors leave you alone to become 'independent' when you know nothing and needed some guidance! And summore, being a sergeant, you need to gain your firefighter's respect. And I am yet to gain their respect enough to listen to my instructions if I need their help on the fire ground. So far, the opposite is happening! At the end of my last duty, they splashed soap water while I was bathing in my cubicle. I hope it's just a welcoming gesture rather than them not liking me. *gulp*

However, being at work and around people is still pretty okay to me. Worse is when I am off duty and return to my grandparents' place. You see, although there are people there, the place is dreary, empty. Half of the time, there isn't even food (it's a mystery how the people there sustain themselves) and I will have to make something to nourish myself. Although I must say that my pay is prolly more than enough to allow me to eat out on every off duty day, I need to save money for my university expenses.

I try to revise my A Levels stuff during my off days. However, it's really dull and the fact that many of my exclassmates in secondary school are now learning all sorts of new and advanced stuff keep shouting at the back of my head decimates my motivation.

I don't have many friends in Singapore. In fact, I don't think I have anyone close there at all. I lie down on the bed sheet (ah yes, I don't even have a bed on my own there, I sleep on the carpet, covered with a bed sheet. My grandfather don't like me sleeping on th couch. He thinks that it will destroy his sofa) during the warm, humid nights, scrolling though my contacts on my phone wondering who can I sms, wondering who can I call, wondering who would listen to my rants, wondering who would tell me interesting stuff. After scrolling through the numbers for the thrid time, I will give up and force myself into slumber.

I am lonely.

I am alone in the big city and it's stressing me out. I know that other people have worse problems than myself. Some of the people from my batch have to go through worse training and treatment in their respective stations and I probably do no have the right to complain about anything at all.

Yet, if only I have someone to talk to freely, at any convenient time... that would alleviate my pain so much...

Daydream

I had this dream this morning.

In the dream, I had this power where I can jump superhuman distances!Imagine that you are at the ground floor of an atrium of a shopping complex. Then you jump from the ground floor right up to the fourth floor. That was the power that I had in the dream.

It was an amazing feeling everytime I make a jump... but as the saying goes, with great power, comes great responsibility.

In the dream, people were after me because of my strange ability. As I desperately try to escape from my pursuers who possess extensive resources and numbers (regrettably, the main pursuer was someone dear to me), I took hostage hundreds of people and caused the death of 3 people (one of which was a family member).

It was a really stressful and sad dream... I jumped into air vents and small tunnels, attempting to escape from someone I loved... accidentally caused the death of 2 people, and actually killed a person along the way...

The dream ended when I was given a chance to end everything by running out of the country.

How does one interpret this dream? I take this dream as a caution to myself that I am now a Sergeant. I have been constantly reminded that in my line of duty, the lives of the people under me are partly in my hands. Entrusted to me are powers that could affect people's lives and possibly death.

I must be constantly alert. A second of negligence may cause great jeopardy and deep regret.

-_-"

off days are so boring...

so much free time but no one to spend it with...

sigh...

how do people make friends again? I seem to have forgotten how it works...

First 24-hour duty Over!

If nothing happens, Saturdays are pretty much a very peaceful time in my fire station.

People within the boundary of my station were fire safe last night.

I thank you all for letting us sleep peacefully last night...

Sergeant Jamil and his Random Vacation

On April 1st 2009, after a very long and gruelling 24+2 weeks, I successfully graduated from the 31st Emergency Response Specialist Course.

I am now... Sergeant Jamil!

[insert dramatic music here]

A picture from the reception after the graduation ceremony

The cute girl is my friend's younger sister, if you can see in the background between us is the jealous Sergeant Sun, one of my instructors. Lolz!

In the end I got to be posted to the station that I wanted;

I am now a proud member of the Bukit Batok Fire Station!


I am given a week's break after my course. Since almost everyone in my course went for some sort of vacation, I decided to take off up north to KL again to visit the places I wasn't able to go to last year.

On the first day I went to Chow Kit and got myself some cool apparels. I also visited the Chow Kit Firehouse.

On the second day I went to the Genting Theme Park!

The Space Shot was awesomeness. I went on it twice. The rest of the rides were great too. Honourable mention would be the Flying Coaster... too bad the Cyclone was under maintenance on that day... *sigh*

On the third day, I wanted to go and have a dip in Sunway Lagoon not knowing that they are closed on Tuesdays... So I went ice skating for the first time instead.

On the fourth day, I went to the Hang Tuah Fire Station, the oldest and biggest station in KL.

Fellow SCDF comrades, I understand that we are very proud of our job and organization. And I know very well that the mention of the Malaysian Bomba will most probably elicit derisive and condescending remarks from most of you, but believe me, after seeing their 'jentera' (aka appliances) and equipments, they deserve great respect for doing what they do under the circumstances that they are in.

They have some cool equipments that we don't have in the SCDF - like this Fire Extinguishing Bomb!

Most of their rescue equipments are from ResQtec. Their spreader and cutter are combined. Their power unit looks smaller and lighter. Their airbags can be connected and stacked via the metallic component you see in the pic below.

There are also some equipments in their pumper that they develop on their own in their backyard lab.

On their Rapid Intervention Motorcycle (RIM), they have floating pumps, which can do suction simply by throwing the tiny pump into the water. There is also this small cutter which is battery operated, but have enough power to cut up an entire car in the hands of a proficient user.

According to Pak Cik Naga, the proud, seasoned firefighter who gave me the tour, 3 RIMs is equivalent to one pumper. One carries rescue equipment, one carries firefighting equipment and the other carries water supply equipment. That, in my opinion is just fantastic!

Pak Cik Naga also explained to me how do they operate. They do 12 hour shifts although some stations do practice the 24 hours shifts. All bomba are proficient in rappelling and first responders do it very frequently. In suicide cases, bomba is the incident manager!

Of course there are aspects that I think SCDF does it in a much better fashion, but nevertheless, these men deserve the respect that all firefighters and rescuers from all over the world deserve.

I spent the night on the 27th floor of Vista Komanwel C, which was the athletes' village for the 1998 Commonwealth Games. The insanely tall apartments are now used as hostels by the students of IMU.

The next day, I sneaked into IMU and joined the morning medical lecture for the 1st sem students!

After the morning lecture on Friday, I made my way back to JB...

And that was the end of my random adventure.

It's back to fire and rescue for me now!