I stepped off the ferry onto Tekong Island, an offshore island where most of Singapore’s Basic Military Training is conducted. I was with my parents and my aunt who were invited as part of the SAF’s outreach efforts to allow our loved ones to better understand what National Service is about. In groups of twenty, we were brought about by a soldier (who I discovered later was my platoon sergeant) to the barracks, the museum, and the cookhouse.
I think it is noteworthy to highlight that the sergeant was very cordial and polite to the guests during the tour and wore a smile on his face throughout the tour. After having lunch at the cookhouse, the guests were ushered back onto the ferry where they would be transported back to mainland, leaving us, the new recruits, on Tekong to start our two-week confinement. Once the guests had left, the smile on the sergeant’s face vanished and he shouted at us “You have thirty seconds to get into columns of five on the parade square now!”. The entire canteen scrambled. “… THREE, TWO, ONE. YOUUUU”, the sergeant pointed at one guy who was still running to get into line “KNOCK IT DOWN.” The guy froze, confused. The sergeant sighed and told the guy to do ten push ups when he realized that the guy did not understand what ‘knock it down’ meant. This incident was etched in my mind because I remembered laughing at the hilarity of the scene and was subsequently asked to ‘knock it down’ as well when the sergeant saw me smiling. On retrospect, I see Gee’s idea of discourses as an ‘identity kits’ clearly being played out here – The sergeant, as a tour guide, adopted the discourse of a public ambassador when he interacted with the guests (civilians) and spoke in a manner so that they could understand him. He subsequently changed his persona to that of a fierce, authoritarian commander when our BMT officially started and therefore, his discourse also changed. This is indicative in the use of a secondary language, ‘army lingo’, that go beyond his primary language of standard English (Gee, 22). The words ‘knock it down’ were ordinary everyday English words but implied a meaning that differs from their standard use.
Recruit getting his hair shaved by the resident Malay Barber
I spent the rest of the day collecting my military gear that included two large field packs, pixelated uniforms and outfield equipment. We were taught how to arrange the items according to a prescribed order in our assigned cabinet. By evening, I already had my hair shaved and was dressed in army slacks. As I laid in the bunk bed that night, I felt weird, displaced and honestly did not know what I was doing.