How do you want your life to be?

Ah yes.. that cheeky catch phrase used by the Singapore Armed Forces(SAF) adverts which proliferated throughout the island nation's mainstream media was used again at the starting line of our final dragonboat race for the season -- at the grand finals for the Singapore Dragon Boat Association(SDBA) Masters' Series .

Indeed, our lives are really how we want it to be, whether we give our best and stay in sync with the team throughout the race sets, bringing glory and fostering the notion of family within the team. Though I have to admit that it was extremely tactful of team captain Teddy to point out that irregardless of the outcome of the race, we would still be heroes of the morning, and once we retire to our homes, it's studying all over again.

*imitates book flipping motion*

*flip flip flip*

"TAN JO! Push TEN!! READY!"

"READY!"

"GO!!"

"3.. 2.. 1.. and,"

"ONE" "TWO" "THREE" "FOUR" ....... well, you get the point ^^


Anyway, we only managed to come out a modest 2nd for the race, losing to the excellent performance of the team from NJC.

I wouldn't say that there was alot to talk about for the race, as in, the whole race was really a 'budget' race. Organiser SDBA really outdone themselves this time -- no drum, no dragon head, no dragon tails were attached to the boats. Addtionally, the competitors actually do not need to have a drummer. For the uninformed, dragon boat drummers functions as the control center of any dragon boat, calling out orders for changes in stroke styles and strategy, additionally, he is also the one who will be holding on to what we fondly refer to as "The Sausage", a small white, cocktail-shaped bouy anchored to the bottom of the lake which is used to align all the boats at the starting point for a particular race. Basically, TeamNUS was the only team to have rowed in the heats with a drummer(partly because we found out too late that we didn't one, and we couldn't possibly ask our dear Vincent to jump overboard right? xD)

Well, perhaps one thing worth mentioning was the unsportsmanly behavior shown by the team from the Australian Chamber of Commerce(AUSCHAM) during our semifinals, in which they took the lane next to ours. Because we chose to row with a drummer, they were threatening to make complaints against us to the officials for cheating. Technically, putting one extra, non-rowing person on the boat seems to be more of a handicap than an unfair advantage to me, but of course we clarified with the official starter on this, but not before the jeers and sneers from the AUSCHAM boat.

"H'mate, sure, you guys go ahead and row with your drummer, so that we can make complaints about you to the officials so that you guys will get a 5 sec addition to your race timing later so that we will beat you for sure.." well.. something along those lines..

So you can imagine how it spoiled the mood of the team for that race.. good thing we still managed to scrape thru into finals dspite the distractions. Despite being Australians, civilised white men, yada yada, their behavior really lack sportsmanship, not to mention class and stature. Just a friendly reminder would've been more than sufficient. Their actions are really a big contrast from the usual warm and friendly treatment that our team has received over the past from the Canadian and German teams. Perhaps it is a fallacy to stereotype against a whole nation's countrymen, through the actions of a mere few, which I shall not commit, but this incident will certainly make me think twice about setting my impression of Australians in the future.