something i forgot to post a long time ago, hurhur
Holy Innocents’ Hornet Scout Troop
Noel Chua
Reflection on Chiang Mai International Camporee ’07.
18-27 Dec 2007
Firstly I would like to thank the people we organized this Camporee and the people who brought it to Hornet Scout Troop, which is namely Mr Ang, Eugene Tay who informed me about this camp and Mr Ng who subsidized half of the cost.
Through this trip I’ve learnt the true meaning of being prepared, in fact it is almost impossible to “be prepared”, it’s just a certain mindset, a way of thinking. In my own words, being prepared is preparing for the worst, by thinking that way everything that comes to you will seem better, I brought 1 roll of coms cord and 1 roll of insulating tape there, and we create so many gadgets, all might be simple but again, we went with nothing.
I learnt how to listen, when you don’t understand people and people don’t understand you, in this case, it is verbally, listen and follow the majority, you just might be able to figure what they are trying to say, and when they make a mistake, try to let them know by correcting them, and not just by saying, doing action, because as I already mention, they don’t understand what you might be saying which is what happened during the camp.
Through listening I also learnt how to accept other people’s suggestions, although the suggestions may not be the best but it’s still a suggestion, from that suggestion one may improve on it, so it gets better and better, thus creating a better outcome of something.
This trip is a real eye opener for most of us, people should be corrected if they say that Singapore is a great country, the people from Chiang Mai or should I say Thailand are so much friendlier then the people from Singapore no wonder they call Thailand a land of thousand smiles, in a recent podcast over the internet, it was saying that so what is Thailand is a land of thousand smiles, Singapore is a land for 4 million smiles, I beg to differ, 4 million fake smiles I should say, whereas Thailand has smiles that come from the heart, warm and sincere smiles. The things there are cheap, and the weather is very nice.
The trip into the city changed my thinking a lot, I used to think and Chiang Mai was a dark and filthy place to be in, I was so wrong.
Overall I REALLY enjoyed this trip, I felt like I was at home while at Mon Come On campsite, lush greenery cold fresh air in the morning, star studded skies in the night,
And I guess I have attained a higher level of thinking, it made me more mature towards life. Oh and I would really hope to go back there often, as a scout or as a leader, in the near future.
