Monday, September 27, 2010

Manik Kayu 1 - PR part 2

State Commissioner Mejar Mior Rosli addressing the course participants..

Rope session with our trainer

Cikgu Chan (centre) learning a hitch from a trainer

The completed gadget..

Leadership encompasses a wide range of values.
It can never attribute to what you learn on the fly.
While some may have leadership qualities, not all are leaders.
On day two of the Wood Badge course, I saw the best and worse in all five characters in my patrol.
The two teachers - Chan and Mike were very helpful. Infact, they were the nicest people I've ever met who are half my age.
Student Tan too was kind enough to show how a Turk's head knot is tied.
The biggest surprise was our patrol leader - the railwayman.
Despite his experience and qualification as a King Scout, our humble leader was a team player and the entire course participants' live wire.
He provided help without question, taught when asked and was always there so spare a helping hand.
And in all that hoolabaloo, the most disturbing character was a young man who carries the rank of "Persuruhjaya Ibu Pejabat" or literally - District headquarters Commissioner.
On the first impression, this dude seemed to be very young to be a Commissioner.
I later found out that the post was an experimental thing on a two-year trial period.
I was also told that the boy was leading SMK Raja Abdullah.
Bob and I took part at an inter-district competition in this school some light years ago.
Okay, I am gonna touch on the juicy part: Our patrol had to learn the 10 knots required for the Senior Scouts.
During the first beat, I had problems with the Turk's head and short splice.
This Commissioner dude tried to teach, and me, well, being old and clumsy, wasn't quite able to follow suite.
Then I can see the frown and temper which is showing on his face.
Here's my take: If you can't teach a fogie like me, how on earth are you going to teach a group of teenagers with raging hormones.
Round one - The truth is beginning to rear its ugly face.
Moving on from rope works to first aid, we had a gadget building session.
At this point, the weather began to suck.
It rained as we worked to build a table complex based on the tripod structure.
If you work together, its not hard and we can finish this fast.
The goal here: is to complete the assignment, not to compete to be the best.
Again, our young Commissioner dude began to show his bad qualities.
He ran down our Patrol leader by making pun of his King Scout badge.
And when it comes to lashing down the structure, this guy insisted to do things his own way.
I just followed orders and tried to do as much and ended up sweeping the place.
That Commissioner bullshit artist, well, since he was omnipotent, he'd do the whole thing by himself - which is something he had wanted to prove to us old fogies.. Hahah!
And when the task was completed, I did my part to haul the gadget to the camp ground.
Later, we had to present a song session during the campfire night which is attended by State Commissioner Mejar Mior Rosli.
The Patrol Leader told us to follow his suite and do as told.
Lucky for that, we scraped through the night.
I also learned that the Railwayman did what he could to breathe life into the night.
It could have fucked up majorly if someone who does not know his thing had taken helm.
As for the rest of the night, I learned many things.

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