21

Blue mattresses lay on the cold hard floor. Early morning sunlight filtered from the clear windows. As I descended the stairs , the four boys who lay on the mattresses were just stiring from their sleep.

" I cannot open my eyes," said of one them, half-dressed and his shorts soaking wet.

His handphone rang. Groping around he found his handphone and fumbled with the buttons.

"Hello?" he answered, his voice strained.

"Sorry I cannnot make it for the football match," and with that, ended his call.

******

In about a month and a half, I will officially be no longer a teenager.

Not so for my Army friend who held his birthday celebration in Costa Sands Resort. He turned 21 on Friday.



Enter the real world, Cyril(in red).

Yeah. That's the man himself in striking red.

Of course we weren't the only ones there. Sitting around in their bermudas and singlets was the canoeing team. Also around were his fellow camp instructors, one of whom helped me with the above shot.

The music was loud, the air was warm and the manjong game was just heating up when the cake was brought out. That was when the party really began.


Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears.

After his mandatory speech which reminded me of my conductor with all his arm waving, the knife was brought out. That was also about the time when Derek stole my digital camera and appointed himself as official photographer of the event.


"Who cares about the manjong game, I can play with my eyes closed", thought Derek.

Just we thought the cake was about to be served, the cheap plastic knife given by the confectionary broke, part of it stuck in the cake itself. Another metal knife substituted it and the cake was officially served.

But cakes, as we all know, weren't only for eating. And so all of my platoon mates hunted Cyril down and battered him with cake. The appetiser over, we took him by force, one person to each limb and threw him into a big green dustbin.


I'm not Oscar, the Grouch!

But that was as far as we got,with only his behind in the bin. Being the good sport that he was( It was his birthday afterall), happily went back to the chalet to clean himself up.

Unfortunately for him, his other friends wanted a piece of the action too. Right after he come out clean and ready to party the night away, he found himself in another dustbin, this time, head first. As an act of goodwill, one of his friends planned to drown him in a bottle of F&N orange.


Did I mention about the F&N orange?

Amazingly, he got himself out, choked half to death with the F&N orange, cake all over him and another set of clothes ruined. This was a party he wasn't going to forget soon.

After he came out, there was another minor skirmish with his other Army friends which wasn't half as bad as the former ones.

With the all the sabotage out of the way, we got on with our Manjong game.

The Vodka was brought out and in the midst of the cantonese crooning and shouts of "pong!" the night slowly turned to day.

******

My friends tell me it was about 3 to 4 am when it happened.

Alvin, who was never a good drinker drank his last "shot" of Vodka. Ferrand and him decided to go for a walk. It was a good couple of mintues before Jonathon and Chin Da ,who were at the same table found them missing. In their drunken state, they decided to look for them.

" I hope I won't regret this," Alvin slurred.

He jumped into the pool.

Ferrand was beside the pool, playing with the water. Far-off, a security guard was watching.

Johnathon and Chin Da found them after swaying about much like the palm trees outside my house.

They came back together and after laying down the mattresses, went straight to sleep.

Yes. Even Alvin with his wet shorts.