My final leadership camp

Here’s the RM70 worth of blog post – from attending a “Kem Kepimpinan Pelajar Cemerlang” (yay, stupid name!) from 1st June (Wednesday) till 3rd June, Friday (today).

Day 1 – 1st June, Wednesday
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I’m skipping all the tedious we-waited-for-bus-till-9am-when-we-reached-school-at-8am, right to the part when we reached Hulu Langat, which incidentally is my hometown - mum’s side.

On the way, we were stuck in a traffic jam which was caused by a terrific accident (I can’t really see, as the ambulance and the fire engine was blocking the wreckage). Apparently a local Malaysian car (can’t remember its model) was smashed up pretty bad, and our bus had to detour using an extremely narrow lane.

Yeah, the accident. Fire engines are blocking it so don’t have any good shots worth selling to the tabloid.

When we reached Pusat Latihan Yadim, what we saw ahead of us was a pretty run-down looking asrama. It looked like a school building, and definitely very kampung-ish..

We have 3 dorms for the guys, and the majority of us Form 5 guys stayed in Dorm 1 which has more double-decker beds than other dorms. It has:

i) red ants crawling over the electrical sockets
ii) the dirtiest, blackest, dustiest, meanest looking PILLOWS I have ever seen in my entire life
iii) donuts in a red plastic bag in the only opened locker, which I presumed has expired months ago

And to our horror, the toilets were fungus-infested, cobweb-crawled, and a very dismal toilet/bathroom overall. The toilets were like my school’s toilet, separated into two where one is where you pee and the other is where you shower – except these toilets are much more smaller.

In the end, we got our pillowcases so it wasn’t too bad, and the bedsheet was pretty thin and couldn’t really fit the mattresses.

First day. I can’t really remember what happened exactly (and I certainly wouldn’t want to recall), but all I remembered was at the canteen, the food was mediocre – sometimes good, sometimes bad, but I can’t really expect much from a rural area. We get to eat 5 times a day: breakfast, lunch, tea, dinner, supper.

The sirap usually tastes like diluted coloured water, except for the final day which is the nicest among the 3 days there.

And we wash our own dishes!

We were pretty much stuck in the forsaken hall the entire day listening to the drones of the speakers that I have absolutely NO interest to take in. We played several games - one of them the same ol’ blindfolded one that supposedly would prepare us for the Nightwalk later that night.

Our creations were stepped on and destroyed into pieces by the penceramah, citing some stupid moralistic crap to suit his module – something like ‘don’t you feel angry that someone destroys your hard work in an instant when you took a long time to build it? Now you know.’


When you’re left with very little entertainment in the middle of a lonely rural area, this is what you will do in your free time.

I was looking forward to it as it’s an outdoor activity, but we had to go through several modules (which is what they called for each activity) before the Nightwalk at midnight (and I can tell you, the darkness was pitch-black and absolutely blinding).

We had to meditate while the speaker droned in our heads, and I didn’t really concentrate much as my legs and back were aching and my mind filled with “WTF am I doing here, MEDITATING of all the frigging activities you can think in the world?”.

After that one-of-a-kind module, it was time for our Nightwalk and I was very worked up, excited. I was the leader of our group, “Sangat”, out of 7 groups (Saya, Sangat, Suka, Minum, Susu, Lembu, Bunting. Yep, creative ain’t it?).

When we walked out to the road and walked straight all the way through the lonely street; my group at first walked in a train-style as the girls insisted so, and to our surprise, our group nightwalk ended as quickly as the radio signals received on an Astro decoder, and it’s barely 1km.

Next, we had to walk inside what looked like a jungle (which is not, as it has tar road) – alone! By this, the younger girls were crying and I felt a little afraid initially. Before we enter we had to read this passage, which goes something like “Pak Sako mati dibunuh di Tanjung Hantu. Sila bawa kain putih dan kapan ke tanah perkuburan di Bukit Pontianak.” I have no frigging idea what it meant, so I read it twice and finally gave it up and walked right in, skipping Group 1’s turn as some girls were still staying behind.

The sky was adorned with many, many stars - a sight you won’t see in towns and cities, and the silence was deafening, with only crickets making whatever their sounds are called.

I walked inside, a bit uneasily, while singing to Mambai’s Kau Ilhamku to myself as the first stanza starts off with, “Beribu bintang di langit..” The entire stretch looked scary, and the scariest part was when there was water on the road in the frigging darkness, with light at an abandoned toolshed.

I backtracked a little, wanting to wait for Jun Man who was behind me, but in the end I walked right up, past the miniature man-made stream of water. I proceeded steadily, still singing that tune while words like “dibunuh, pontianak, hantu” flashed through my head. There were also 3 man-made scares – leaves brushing suddenly, some black figure calling out to you which I promptly ignored, and the facilitators at the end of the road.

I was relieved when it was over, but also disappointed as it was too short. Less than 10 minutes, I think.

By that time it was 2am, and I took my second bath of the entire day and slept.

Day 2 – 2nd June, Thursday
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We spent the entire fucking day in the hall. That covers up the whole day. The end. :)

Right, we also went to the river in the evening, which they told us “sangat dalam, kena jalan agak lama untuk sampai ke dalam hutan.”

Oh joy, I thought, and we walked in a straight train-like fashion again and we were barely 50m in the jungle when we reached the aforementioned river.

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Our teammates of Group 2 – Sangat!

Do remember the bastard’s face, responsible for the extraction of tears from the participants of this camp. And poor Thevadass and Mazafira (not in picture) was laughed at by the participants with yet another stupid module. Whee!

Chickens of 5 varieties. 5 groups for debate. Discuss.

Miss Then and the girls in the river. A rare sight.

RIVER!!

Poor Das was stripped by the guys. >_> I play no part in it!

And another group pic. I hate my camera at times – snapping group shots resulting in blurred results.

Of course, I can’t pass up the only chance for me to go for one of the only outdoor activities, and I had fun. But as things go, it was for only about an hour before we have to go back to that run-down place.

It said “jungle-trekking” in the agenda, but it was supposedly postponed to later at night – and again, I really, really looked forward to it. At this point, I think I’m sounding pretty sad – the pathetic-sad kind.

A game by the non-Muslims to cook up some tepuk to battle it out between the guys and the girls. Look at the happy faces! Now scroll down to the crying part. (No more pictures after this, as I don’t think anyone snapped any pics during the mass-weeping session.)

After spending yet another meditating session where girls (and some guys) weeped when two sob stories were related to us, supposedly “real”: one about an extremely poor guy whose parents died due to lack of care from other siblings and poverty and finally achieved success when he got a PhD (see, how short it is to describe it than spending 30 minutes meditating on a single story?) while the other was about an extremely good ustazah but when she died, not a single student attended her funeral.

Like I said, I couldn’t really concentrate as my limbs were aching, and I rolled my eyeballs while my eyelids remained shut, at every injuncture I thought was.. a little fake.

Next, we had to participate in this activity, Pencarian 2020, which required all of us to shut our mouths while communicating through other means: paper, etc. We had to piece up all the pieces provided to us, and it was then we realised we were missing two pieces.

I’m not sure what that fucking idiot (I can’t be bothered to remember the penceramah’s name, but he shall be known with the variety of vulgarities I will be injecting here =)) had in mind, but we had to find, find, search for it in the entire hall while being laughed at said idiot. When we were clued that one of the people in the hall has the missing pieces, it was to the point we begged, kneeled down (and the Penghulu, Penghuluwati and all group leaders including yours truly were in front of the entire pack) at these people, asking for the missing piece.

Pn Anisah looked at us, her eyes looking all weird and finally went off in a huff, muttering, “Saya tak nak terlibat dengan permainan ini.” Come on, we were made to look like complete fools, and I can’t blame her.

Just for the record, our Penghulu was Ridzwan from 5A, as elected democratically and Penghuluwati was Suet Li (also called by the penceramahs as Sweater or Sweetie).

When Abang Indera, our lab assistant, clued us further after at least 20 minutes worth of worthless searches that the good-for-nothing puntamone (Tamil for something I rather not mention here) has the last missing piece, all 9 of us, Penghulus and group leaders, went to him and asked for the piece and he asked us to dance.

We danced stupidly to an equally stupid Malay song, and then at The Ketchup Song the entire hall erupted to a disco-like trance. That was when the bastard stopped us, scolded, insulted, humiliated us, and with his shitload of so-called “motivation”. “Tak ada maruah kamu ke, berjoget, menari-nari di atas pentas,” he said, when the fucker himself instructed us to do so. He proclaimed OBEDIENCE and the usual shit in his earlier talks, and when we were obedient and followed his words, we were struck down relentlessly. WTF?

The rest of this game ended with us in a marching stance. Bowed to that fucker, muttered our ikrar to that fucker.. I was completely, utterly disappointed and bitter because we’re not doing any outdoor activities, but playing a stupid game, supposedly for motivation and leadership qualities.

Bullshit. :)

Next, after insulted and humiliated us enough, he proceeded with his Titanic game. Oh noes, more closing eyes and sitting in a meditation form! After his narration, Ridzwan and Suet Li, as our two leaders, were asked to choose 3 guys and 3 girls “yang kamu anggap tidak menyumbangkan apa-apa kepada kumpulan”. Basically, choose 6 people our two leaders deemed as useless, so they could “die” and save the entire ship.

All of us thought it was another stupid ploy of trying to break us up, so Ridzwan cleverly said, “Kalau satu mati, semua mati. Kalau semua hidup, semua hidup.”

Wrong answer. He was promptly shot down, “tak tahu dengar arahan ke! [infinity exclamation marks follow]” and “kamu pemimpin yang GAGAL!”. At this point, all of us can clearly see both Ridzwan and Suet Li under loads of stress and tension as they felt utterly bad for each person they choose.

For delaying the whole thing, both of them have to choose 4 additional “useless” students to come forward to the stage.

And when the “useless” students were enquired whether they deemed themselves worthy to survive, whether they should die or not, these younger kids wept openly. Oh fucking god.

And Suet Li, Ridzwan cried. They felt so bad for these people, and I can’t imagine myself in their shoes. I was enraged at the fucker that toyed with us, playing with our emotions to the point that I forgot all about the crying.

After finished selecting these unfortunate people, we had to make a huge circle and were then given four straws each: one to keep for ourselves, and three we give away to people we deemed worthy to live on.

I can’t help but feel that the previous “choose useless people” was another of their ploy to start another stupid game. Right, it can hardly be called a game - but an activity of the lowest form. Suet Li looked at me, two people away from me on my left saying, “we can’t help it!” and I mouthed to her in return, very incensed, “That stupid lousy mtherfucker.”

As these people walked around a huge circle, forced to look eye-to-eye to that person and say, “Anda tak layak untuk hidup,” they cried. These people, girls and guys alike wept and the entire hall was a mass-weeping session.

People I hardly know: that small prefect Praveendran in our dorm cried like anything, these tough Malay chain-smokers cried, looked at me and cried, Shamin cried an ocean, Bazlin, Fahmi, Jessica, Esther, Justine, Tharsini… Christ.

The worst part was people I thought wouldn’t ever cry in public did that: Ting, next to me had tears on his face, I dunno, even Jun Man, Thevadass. I mean, what the heck, when you have an entire hall crying so goddamn emotionally, you can’t help but cry as well - which I can’t help the tears in my eyes.

I can’t say that people who didn’t go for the camp would actually understand the situation. Telling people in their faces “you don’t deserve to live” was pretty insulting, as Jun Man had said, and all of us wanted everyone to live.

In the end, I gave the first straw to Sasi, walked past the Chinese girls in my class, Xin Hui, Wei Kee, Joyce, asking them discreetly in Chinese whether they have a straw or not, and when Joyce asked me to give it to Chua Yen Sin, I actually gave it to her - being the kind person that I am.

And last one was to Shawn, which I initially asked the same question in Chinese and Shawn answered he already have one, but when I noticed the facilitator looking at me, I gave it quickly and walked away.

At the end of this sadistic activity, probably enjoyed a lot by that sonofabitch, four people remained as THE leaders with the most straws - Eugene, Mazafira, Suet Li, Ridzwan (with 23 straws). I truly respect Ridzwan a whole lot after this, for his capabilities and true leadership qualities. Really.

I had 5 straws, 4 given to me if anyone wants to know.

It was frigging 1.30am after the activity, and we didn’t even noticed the time. Which means, no jungle-trekking/burung hantu!

We ended up sleeping at about 3am after a few of us, Sasi, Saravana, Shawn, Thevadass, Junman and I slept on the floor (with our mattresses) in a group chatting away at night. Apparently JM and Das spent their time till 4.30am staring at the moon together outside the dorm. LOL. One of the Malay guys’ alarm beeped at 4.30 (which is when the Muslims are supposed to wake up o_O), and only then did they realise their moon-gazing activity had taken far too long.

Day 3, 3rd June – Friday
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The non-Muslims in my dorm woke up at about 8.30am, which was pretty late. Kean Leong was sick since the day before, and he even went for the Nightwalk which is what surprised me the most (even Wei Kee! Joyce! O_O).

Breakfast, gathered-in-hall-listening-to-speeches (including Pn Rubiah’s >_>), lunch, and back we are at about 2pm in school.

Did I enjoy it? I dunno, maybe hardly. I don’t think I learnt much out of this, to be a “great leader”. A select few modules were fun, but apart from that, 95% of this entire camp was - yes, for probably the fourth time I’m mentioning this, a huge bitter disappointment. A fat RM70 flying down the river.

I was also pretty sick of various ex-Rembutia-ers saying to my face “last year at Rembutia…” when last year’s outdoor activities outdid this one by a huge majority. Kalah tanpa bertanding I’d say. Yep, I AM bitter.

I expected fun, pure outdoor fun, and in the end, I guess I’m destined to be stuck indoors for the rest of my frigging life. Look at the Australia plan. Nada. Poof.

If I don’t go backpacking at the end of this year, I’m giving up planning anything else hinthint to Hengli ;)

Most interestingly, throughout the three days at the camp, almost none of us went to the toilet to excrete dung (sorry if it sounded a little tasteless, but it’s definitely mild compared to Shawn screaming loudly while showering after swimming in the river, that he had sand underneath his balls and in his asscrack >____>). Shawn called it “The Feel”, as the toilets were SO dirty none of us felt any urge to poo anymore.

Three days gone. I swear I won’t attend any leadership camps in the future – the word ‘camp’ is so grossly misused, and I mistook it from the real camp I longed.