Rambo: First Blood

Monday, noon. Tb made his way out of Bishan MRT. The last time he saw it, it was still under renovation; it still is. The gantries seemed to have shifted. He then made his way to the toilet at J8 instead of the makeshift ones outside the station. People are naturally late, he thought to himself.

Found out that he was not the sole person to arrive early. Met another of his classmate in the same toilet. Both of them made their way outside to wait for the others. After 5 min of stoning around breathing in cigarette smoke and getting baked by the sun, they decided to loiter around J8 instead.

After some time at Comics Connection, they received a call to meet the rest soon. Both of them made their way down back to the station. Joined by two others, they waited at Bishan bus stop. Some time later, a pathetic looking lorry made its way toward them.

"Up the lorri!" The four of them had to make their way at the back together with their barang barang, since the front cabin was fully occupied. The searing afternoon heat was quite unbearable; they were occasionally relieved by the wind generated when the lorry moved.

The gearbox of the lorry was cranky. Tb's friend had to use all his might to change the gears, resulting in an uneven ride. The four held on to their dearest lives at the sides of the lorry. It was a double whammy of searing heat and a screwed up lorry. Tb almost flew halfway across the lorry when it suddenly braked. Other minor events happened as well, such as a taxi tailgating the lorry as well as several horns here and there. Tb noted that his skin was turning red.

Picked up another person at Bedok MRT after an uneventful ride from Bishan. Went to her factory to collect junk materials, which made Tb wonder if they were really karang guni in disguise. Went to Ubi, in almost the exact same way back to Tb's place of nightmare. The humps did not help alleviate his mood, as there was no suspension in the lorry.

The lorry managed to successfully parallel park, though it took some time and by then there were two cars behind waiting; Tb was surprised that they didn't horn. Alighted from the lorry to do sai gang; transported some wooden pellets, sieved through dustbins and helped the factory owner do some spring cleaning by lugging away their cardboards. Tb and gang must have cleared away years of dust in one single day. And hence the dust and millions of microbes were displaced onto their hands. "Geez, we are not even paid to do this," as Tb thought to himself, pulling out a styrofoam strip from a rubbish bag, "even recruits get paid to do sai kang".

Returned back to NUS. Once more, Tb and gang were baked twice under the sun. Once baked, twice roasted. Dumped all the junk, or rather, the recyclable materials into a small room in NUS, not before pressing the oil to the max trying to reverse the lorry upslope. After a short respite, the lorry made its way for a second round to get more junk from IMM, leaving Tb and one other guy to breathe in the dust in the air-con room.

Both of them rested a while in the room. Tb decided to illegally used the com to watch Rambo. He realised that tvlinks.com can go to hell, seriously. Youtube is a much better alternative to watch Rambo III and IV. After satiating his bloodlust for TV violence, Tb had no choice but to start on the dreary job of cutting cans.

The lorry had left at 3pm. It was 9pm and the lorry had not returned. By then, stomachs were growling. The only thing that Tb had for breakfast was tao hui, which was not even considered a proper meal. Innumerable can shrapnels had filled the table , as Tb tried to distract his stomach by cutting more cans.

930pm. The lorry had finally arrived. As expected, it carried more junk for the sai kang warriors to dump into the room. After washing their hands off it, the tired and hungry guys proposed to go to Fong Seng for supper, since Subway at NUS was closed by then.

The lorry stalled a couple of times, due to inexperience in handling the lorry as well as the screwed up gearbox. After stuttering its way across NUS, they finally made it to the 24hr coffeeshop.

"Eh, you sure you wanna park here?" Tb asked. His concern was that it was in front of semi-d. "There's still a couple of space behind that lorry" "Never mind, just eat chop chop can liao, the lorry also need some space to reverse"

By then, Tb and his gang were already in "Man mode". With growling stomachs, they hastily agreed and made their way for their lunch/dinner/supper.....To be continued.