Twin towers

Cheeling and i always took the back seat. Over time, we got used to rowing beside one another. Coz of our different rowing styles, as strange as it may seem, most of the time, my elbow would always knocked her knuckle. It really got on my nerves initially, especially during races. But we just got used to it, coz if you can't solve the problem, you just gotta live with it.

See, that's what happens when you seat two tall people together.

Getting spiritual

There's something about races which makes everyone become religious. I guess once you've settled the mental and physical, you have to cover the spiritual as well. It's having the sense of security knowing that you've got all aspects covered, having done all you can for the race.

If anything goes wrong... well, that's just bad luck.

Mugger-mania

Everybody know us for the distinct ivp jackets in the YIH study room. In throngs, we can probably occupy at least 12 seats. People come as early as 7am and stay all through the night. Spending up to 12 hours there per day, we eat, sleep, play and workout there. At times, the crazy can be seen doing push-ups in the study room, perhaps from a lost game or just to fight off the koon-demon.

Dgnbters have been colonizing the YIH study room for as long as i can remember. Even when renovations for the new YIH started in 2004, we uprooted and moved camp to the temproary function rooms which were opened. As usual, we took it over.

The regular people in the study room must really hate us. But what the hell, tough luck, suck it up... too bad, too sad!!

________________________

It's that time of the year again... on-going paper wars, fighting to get a coveted seat in the study room... Study Hard!... HUAT AH!

Yaaada yaaada yaaaddaaa

The team is well known for it's looooooooonnnnnnnnnggggggggg debriefs. Post-race debrief sessions are especially crazy long coz everyone in the team gets a chance to say something. They typically end after sunset, when night has descended and all the teams as well as the people organizing the event have long left. Then it'd be a mad scramble in the dark to keep our stuff and make our way to dinner.

Someday, someone should attempt to write down what everyone says. It'd probably be enough for a 200 page book on "Dragon Boat Essentials: how not to go home early "

Sin sin sin

Abstinence is an essential part of race preparations. No spicy, no coconut, no excessive oily and fried foods, cutting down on the sweet and sugary goodies. Part tradition, part desire to revenge the food ban, the agenda of the first post-race dinner thus has to be filled with high fat and high cholesterol. So bring on the Char Kway Tiao, the sambal stingray, the fried hokkien mee, sambal fried kang kong, sambal sotong, fried oyster, fried carrot cake and laksa.

Happiness is short lived as the return of sinful foods to a once pure stomach results in the churning of the tummies. Almost half the team would probably return home with an upset stomach. But for the sake of spicy, oily goodness... all is worth it.

More than just rowing

You know dragonboating is a damn serious business when every team starts buying their own boats. Cost of boats range in the tens of thousands range depending if you wanna get yours from China or Germany. The newer boats these days are half lighter than the old fiber-glass boats. Even so, the amount of effort required to move those giant-ass babies is enough for a pre/post-training workout.

Where to stand to lift it up, which way to walk, which direction to launch the boat into the water, which way to flip the boat over, where to place the tyres for the boat to rest on, all requires the team to be highly coordinated in order to move the boat from one location to another quickly and efficently. Evidently the art of boat moving is something that requires skill, precision and a whole lot of practice. *Bleh*... If not it'd just end up as a mass of people each giving their own commands and everyone moving in different directions.

Soap and suds

There are only 12 cubicles at the National Stadium. Weekend trainings with tonnes of other teams only means long queues just to take a bath after training. Which can sometimes be an unpleasant experience if the cubicles are flooded. The way to make things go fast is to wash down before hand, coolie style. So that the washing of the hair and face is done first.

Or alternatively, just skip the whole process and go home straight after training. Apparently it seems to be a trend now. Ewwwwwww!

OTOTs

Back in the days 'OTOT' referred solely to the runs, where we all had to clock our personal best timings and make that mad dash to the finish line. The term 'OTOT' was redefined by Serene and formalised by Mong-na, when it came to mean the process of doing the extra training outside training, on your own and then writing it down in black and white and handing it in to the caps. Typically OTOT sheets are drawn up in calander style formats with boxes for you to fill in whatever workouts you have clocked on your own.

OTOT in the long form means 'Own Time Own Target'. The only thing own-time-own-target about OTOTs is that you can do it whenever you want, in the dead of the night or at the break of dawn. By that, it does not mean you have the liberty to do as little as you wish or wear yourself thin working out 10 times a week. Everyone knows that there's always a kinda unsaid minimum, be it x gym session or x extra runs. Maximum wise, you just gotta listen to your body. In fact, the very act of needing to hand in your OTOT sheets means that you better get your ass moving coz the caps are gonna know how much effort you have been putting in when you make your weekly submissions. And there's no way in hell of even thinking to cheat, coz in the end, it's gonna show up in trainings.

The concept of OTOT has come to be a crucial aspect of training, coz there's only so much training you can do during the formal training timeslots and so the rest has gotta be made up on your own. It's a good way to keep a personal track record of how you are doing, or a really stressful form of social surveillance. Whichever way you see it, OTOTs in the long run ultimately not only makes you stronger both physically and mentally, but more importantly serves to benefit the whole team.

Going branded

The first race jersey to stray away from the traditional 100% cotton ones. It was the Asics dri-fit singlets. Incidentlly, it was one of the best race singlets ever, good material, just the right length and size of arm-holes. But going for the high-tech dri-fit singlets also meant the giving up of the more traditional elobrate singlet designs. Designs which were much sought after by other school teams looking for someone to exchange theirs with.

Dri-fit singlets have since replaced the trusty 100% cotton ones. The no-brand singlets now gave way to the likes of Mizuno, FBT, Asics and SAVA.

Itchy hands

These are the hardcore dragonboaters, hardcore to the bone. The ones who went crawling back. Perhaps it was the urge to cure the itchy-hand syndrome, being irritated by our white, pasty selves or just the desire to feel IT once again. I bet Ah Peng would have returned too if it wasn't for the fact that she had graduated.

As the saying goes... Once a dragonboater, always a dragonboater.

Drummers

One of the best drummers ever, Irene had the composure and steadiness during races, calmly talking the pacers through each race set and ensuring that the rest of the boat didn't sink into a state of panic when races grew incredibly close.

The traditional showering of the dragon head. Showering of the dragon head is done by the drummer, before the boat sets off from the shore. Carried out to wake the dragon and as a measure of good luck.

Small steps

It was the first time in 3 semesters we'd come in first. A sense of euphoria that was long awaited and way overdue. Though it was just the heats, it was small steps to a larger goal.

At the end of the Chinese Garden Races, we embarrassed ourselves by coxing the baby 4-seater boats into other lanes twice and once almost onto the shore. We didn't win any medals that day, but gained a whole new perspective on what we had to impove on. A month later, against all odds and expectations, we made a comeback and won the women's ivp (inter-varsity-polytechnic) gold.

Gifts galore

Yen Li was the pioneer of gift-making for race days. June 2002, she gave all of us a beaded anklet. Since then, i've worn it 11 times only. On the left ankle, to every other race i've been to.

Race-day gift exchanges have evolved from initially being something given out by appointment holders (started by Peiwen), to being given out by the welfare duos (started by Wendy-Isobel duo) to being given out by every single member of the team. Today, race-day gift exchanges is a million dollar industry. With the standards getting higher as the semesters pass.

A tribute to days gone by...

For the past 5 years, i have lived the life of a dgnbtr. When something's been a significant part of your life for so long, it's inevitable that you sleep, eat and breathe it. A lifestyle of great tans, intense work-outs, food bans, heart-pumping races, regiment, discipline and most importantly, great pals.

2001,
I found a new family

2002,
I said goodbye to the seniors I had grown to respect so much,
seniors who thought me all I know about and what it means to be a member of the ladies team

2003,
I experienced the effects of ugly team politics

2004,
at 16 small, I learnt that numbers didn’t matter as long as you had the heart

2005,
I realized in Penang I’d gotten the concept of competitive sportsmanship wrong all this while

2006,
after searching all these years, I finally finally found the true meaning to the phrase
‘1 stroke, 1 boat, 1 heart’

Pw once told me when I was at the crossroads of deciding to stay or not that people never stay because of the sport itself. It’s more than just keeping fit, maintaining a tan, but about the people you row with and row for. That’s the very reason why I constantly plunge myself into crazy self-torture. It’s never about the addiction to the sport but need to be around the people whom I go through thick and thin with, people who’ve seen me at my worst and lowest. People whom i’ve experienced the high of a good race set together and the lows of not winning despite all the hard work put in. People whom I know I can always rely on and trust. People who know when I’m pissed, how hard to push me. And of course the select few who know me the best, can read me like a book and know what I’m thinking and feeling. No one can understand what it’s like to have to sign up for something like this voluntarily, train up to 5 times a week and still need to juggle everything else, and look as though you are still surviving. Only them.

Mong-na’s gonna say I’m having a major hangover. Perhaps that’s just it. But you can’t deny 8 semesters, 5 teams, 6 captains, 69 girls and 12 races. That’s a lot of memories to hold on to and not something that’s easy to let go of. Coz once you’ve been in a team, it becomes part of you and never leaves.

You never forget.