National Day Parade...?

National day eh? I suppose I am around in Singapore during the times that August 9 comes around, and honestly, I've learnt to not take the National Day Parade (NDP) too seriously. The only segment in the NDP that I really enjoy a lot is the initial parade, with all the line-up of the uniformed personnel, and the whole guard-of-honour thing. That portion of the NDP feels more meaningful to me than all the other segments combined, which is usually the main ``meat'' of the show. Somehow seeing the uniformed personnel in formation feels more like a parade than a bunch of loosely connected mass-displays ever was.

Strangely this is something that is completely contradictory to what I used to like in the past---I used to find the parade portion boring and the mass displays portion more interesting. I suppose that tastes change over time, and probably when I was young, I didn't really understand the effort and meaning behind the parade drill, and of course the mass display segments were understandably more alluring due to their colourful combinations of sight and sound. Two-and-a-half years of national service later, I think I have learnt to appreciate what it means to have an armed force capable of providing contingents for a drill parade. There's this certain smugness that I feel each time I see the neat rows and columns of men and women in uniform---I think this shows solidarity of a nation much better than any other mass display can, but that's just my take.

As such, this year's viewing of the NDP over the television was no different from the others---I just watched the early segment of the drill parade and then tuned out to work on some other stuff that I need to do. Incidentally, the stuff I'm working on is related to work, so I shall not talk about that here.

After a year of procrastinating, I have finally procured a new bicycle to replace the boneshaker that I had since national service days. That machine was a second-hand wreck salvaged from Cash Converters a good seven plus years ago, and had undergone quite a bit of restoration works, and have survived at least 3 accidents that I know of. It's no longer that road worthy now (something about shot brakes, misaligned spokes and stuff like that), and so I have decided to get myself another machine that I can use to re-explore the neighbourhood once again, and to get some more exercise. And so I did.

Among the more important things that I did with it was to get it engraved and recorded in the database at the Police Centre as suggested in this circular. So I have a bike that is a little more protected against theft, which is always a good thing.

I never really liked running all that much. The lack of a view, the low stamina of mine, the relatively low speeds all make it a very boring and uncomfortable sport that is not fun. The one and only time that I could run more than 2.4km was when I plugged myself with some relatively high tempo music---I can understand why many runners need to have their music players with them before they can do any form of ``serious'' running.

Anyway, I think that I have digressed a lot by now. Have a happy national day.