Life in National Service - Part 3 - "The 12 Days"

Long time didn't blog about my NS life. Are you waiting like you're waiting for the Halley comet to fly-by? Well, wait no more! Thanks for your patience and support. This time, I would like to blog about "The 12 Days of Suffering". It goes...

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Yay! The day was April 25. The next day would be the coronation of our nation's new Yang Dipertuan Agong, which meant a day off for us trainees! However, our celebration was cut short when the head trainer, KJ (for Ketua Jurulatih), told us that the next day we would be required to watch the coronation. No exceptions. We couldn't do anything, so the next day, we watched the coronation of the King on TVs in the canteen. That was when I felt something wrong. Hey. My body was heating up! Oh man, I gonna had fever! Halfway through the coronation, I couldn't take it anymore. At first, I borrowed some paracetamol, aka Panadol from my friend and had it, but seemed to have little or no effect at all. Finally, I reported to the medic, and they gave me MC for the day. I took the medications and rested in the ward until night. The suffering had only just begun. The doctor, a Sergeant, checked my body temperature again and found nothing wrong. So I was sent back to my dorm. Unbeknownst to me, the next 12 days would be the most suffering and misery 12 days of my life. The next few days, I didn't have fever, but felt very weak and tired. Not until Sunday, April 29th, when I didn't take my fever medicine because I felt quite well. As a result, fever came back in the evening. So I was forced to take the medicine. On Monday, April 30th, we had day navigation. I didn't pay much attention to the activities we did amidst the 12 Days. Then I had fever again right after recreational time, which was about 5.00pm. This had continued for the rest of the 12 Days. Same things happened everyday since that day. Fever in the evening, Warded at night. Recovered at morning, And fever again from evening 'til night. From April 30th to May 6th, I couldn't get my body "fixed"! My fever was so serious that, sometimes my body temperature would rise to 39 degree and sometimes it dropped to 36 degree. This had the medic scratching their heads, "What the heck was wrong?" It was not until the final days, the 12th day, when I had the most serious fever of my entire life. Monday, May 7th, I was having fever again in the evening as usual after recreational period, but this time, things were not the same. Before that, I had rash on my fore arms and legs, which I thought was caused by Dengue. But it itched, and Dengue's rash never itch. Later I thought it was allergy (I took both my friend's Panadol and the medic's, although there had been 5 hours in between), but it was ruled out also because it's quite impossible to have allergy due to the long hours in between. Later it was confirmed as skin allergy because I used the blanket which was very very dirty (I even used it to dry my legs!) These had all happened before that fateful night. But I didn't think it was strange. On the 12th day, however, things turned out to be a hell lot different. May 7th, Monday evening, I had fever as usual. "Oh God, when will this ever end?" I thought. Then I felt something. My waist, near my kidney, hurt a lot when I tried to lie down, and my left shoulder also hurt a lot, even when I didn't move. "Oh no, is this Dengue?" I had to wait until night because the doctors were not in, they were attending some meeting and would be back at around 9.00pm. The pain in my shoulder and kidney were killing me. My friends were there to help me and comfort me. One of them even took care of me while I waited for the doctors to return in the ward. (I will blog about this someday) We chatted and waited until around 9.30pm. Miraculously, the pain and the fever had gone. Checked by the doctor found nothing wrong. I continued my NS the next day, May 8th as usual, and watched as time went by second by second. 3.00pm, checked my forehead, nothing. 4.00pm, checked again, nothing. 5.00pm, checked again... ... ... NOTHING!! HOORAY!! My fever had gone once and for all! At night, I celebrated this by buying bee hoon and drinks. Then came the day when I went home. May 10th. 2 days after I had recovered. I told the whole story to my dad. He was also surprised. "Seems like you were 'zhong xie'", Chinese words literally meaning something like being possessed by evil spirit, or haunted by evil spirit. I thought for a while... Maybe Dad was right.