Has anyone here ever gone through National Service?

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Can anyone please reply?

So, Id reccomend that you get a haircut. Don't even worry about impressing any women (if there are any), a brand new private isn't exactly the ladies' pick. I've seen guys who try to run their game and end up getting shot down big time (I mean hazed). Being AS made it easy for me since I don't expect to get with every piece of eye candy I see.

You also might want to invest some time in an excerscise program. I know what you've been told, but my recruiter told me that the drill sergeants weren't allowed to yell anymore

Also, work on getting some thicker skin. You're gonna have NCOs with a case of the a$$ and they'll take it out on the new guy. It's expected that you'll make some mistakes (please don't plan on making them), these guys work in an office all day and don't feel very masculine, so they compensate by yelling at people when they get away with it. It doesn't do you any good to argue with them, so just save it for WP. I knew this guy who was a paper pusher, he was into karate, had some form of OCD, and could not quit acting tough, even though he wasn't getting shot at in iraq, he was telling all kinds of war stories. I mean they aren't all like that, some of them are just pissed off infantrymen with knee problems.

You have one thing to your advantage. You have zero interest in proving yourself as some sort of rambo. It's ok for THEM to act hardcore, but you're expected to stay out of it (wait until you hit one of those sergeant ranks).

Do yourself a favor and find an outlet for the anxiety, I remember needing constant reassurance from my battle buddies and it only turned them against me, nobody likes a sally

Can anyone please reply?

*hits the ball back to MDD123*

Can you restate the question Ashmeister? I've gone as far as doing a wiki on the Singapore military and I have lots of personal advice to throw into the mix.

Hmm rereading the original post, if I'm not mistaken I don't have the impression that you'll be doing much military stuff at all. You said it's a clerical job in a kind of public service field like firefighting or paramedic services, etc.. If that's the case, then it doesn't really sound like you'll experience anything much different from what you might find in a "normal" workplace environment... which is in itself a whole lot of crap. It just seems to be like a job that you can't quit before your 2 years is up. I don't think you have anything all that unusual to worry about, but you may find it useful to browse through the work/job forum for issues a lot of AS folks go through in the workplace. You even said that you get to go home every night! So I really don't think this is going to be that bad. The horror stories you might have heard about compulsory service in other countries are typically a lot more involved than what you have to go through, so count your blessings!

Can anyone please reply?

So in Iraq, alcohol was illegal. Don't think for a second that anyone was gonna stay there for a whole 12+ months and not find a way to deal with it. Ever hear of "canned air" Well, this guy in my unit did and it nearly got him killed, the thing with canned air is that it acts on your central nervous system and can depress the respiratory drive, that and sometimes the "canned air" induces vomiting (or emisis in medical terms). In other words, it's a dumb way to get loaded.

If you were observant over there, you'd have noticed that in spite of the PX being stocked, the cough medication was in low supply. If you were informed, you'd know that people didn't need it for their "cough" Dextromethrophan, the active ingredient in OTC cough meds is another one of those "alcohol substitutes" a smarter guy would've been loaded off of that instead.

On 25 aug 2006, a complete dumbass decided to drink the entire bottle of robotussin as a part of his birthday present. Little did he know that in 2 hours, a recall mission would come up and he'd be in downtown Baghdad looking over his shoulder every 2 seconds to make sure "Haji" didn't pop up out of nowhere and punch him in the face for being high. On the plus side, it was nightime and he had excellent night vision on account that his pupils were f-ing dilated. Did I mention that I'll never do something like that again? Now somebody wish me a happy birthday, I only have 6 minutes left.