On Saturday afternoon I ended up being sent to hospital with a possibly broken neck. Not good. That I'm sitting here now typing this means it turned out OK but at the time is was rather frightening.
I went to an offsite for work on Saturday at Sentosa. It consisted mostly of sports which were meant to encourage team spirit. This included volleyball, soccer and a very strange rugby-American football hybrid. We played on small sand pitches which for 7 aside teams was a bit of a squeeze. Given the variety of people's sizes, levels of fitness and sheer competitiveness, a few injuries were to be expected. This translated into a number of badly kicked shins, some twisted ankles, one broken ankle, a dislocated finger and some garden variety scratches and strains.
I was playing what was being called touch rugby when the incident occurred. As you could pass forward this wasn't rugby at all but the concept of touch tackles was there... and completely ignored. Because I have a good arm, every time the ball would go out of bounds, I would pass it up the field to a team mate who would then score. We'd run this about 5-6 times and were really creaming the other team.
So all I had to do was play defense and throw the ball in. The guys were getting pretty rough with each other and some serious tackling was happening which was against the rules but wasn't being stopped. I guess the refs gave up trying to stop these alpha males from their natural behavior.
Our side's defensive tactics were proving too effective so the other team started to load the big guys up front. The were getting frustrated and the game kept getting rougher. At this point I should probably not have been on the field at all.
I had made a mental note at the beginning of the day that while on the playing field, I would avoid Ben at all costs (he is notoriously aggressive and has claimed a few victims over the years). It was a good strategy poorly executed. I didn't realize he was nearby when the ball was thrown into our end. He jumped up to make the catch and when he came down, his 90kg landed on me (which incidentally was caught on videotape and on replay looked very much like a WWF slam). He clipped the back of my head which whipped back and I hit the ground like a ton of bricks. I heard my neck crack and felt searing pain as my head whipped back against the sand. I was hurting and more than a little freaked out.
After some commotion, I heard an ambulance. They put the neck brace on then strapped me to a body board and I was sent off to Mount Elizabeth hospital (which took about half an hour with traffic). At the hospital I was X-rayed and declared fit - no breaks. Just a wrenched neck with promises of serious stiffness for the next 2 days.
As a team building exercise, the day was unusually successful in my case. I don't care much for rah-rah outward bound kind of stuff. But when I was hurt, I realized that I had total confidence in the people around me to make sure I would get the best of care. I work with extremely intelligent and competent people who just so happen to be very caring as well. Yes they are competitive and tough but when you need them they are extemely reliable. I know a lot of compassionate people, but if I had to choose who to surround myself with in a time of crisis, I would pick the same people who helped me on Saturday. I realized that I have huge confidence in their abilities. They are extremely capable and I have high regard for them.
So all in all, despite my scare, I think I came out ahead.
Labels: personal
I've lost my brief interest in badminton. We had such high hopes for dear Ronaldo to win the $1m bribe prize and bring Singapore a gold medal. After a brilliant bashing of the 1st seed in the first round of the tourney, he walked over some big white german in the second round but then completely choke in in a 15-10, 15-1 defeat to some guy from Thailand - a country whose athletic fame comes from transexual volleyball players and kickboxers. What a let down.
But all is not lost! There's still one medal contender left. Li Jia Wei has made it through to the semi-finals of the women's table tennis. It's a little harder to get excited because she's obviously a Chinese import. OK so Susilo is obviously an Indonesian import but at least he speaks English which makes him sound kinda, like, sorta, just a tiny bit Singaporean (yes world - they speak English in Singapore despite that funny accent). But if truth be told, Susilo only got citizenship in 2002 whereas Jia Wei has been toughing it out since 1996. That means she's been here since before the Esplanade and the convenience of underground shopping at City Link Mall. The woman is a trooper.
It may seem a bit embarrassing to have to buy in talent this way but given how the home grown athletes have done (dead last in all the swimming heats but it's possible they were held back by their water wings) there's no choice really. Every child from a third world country now has the hope of growing up to be a Singaporean with the opportunity to with $250,000, $500,000 or even $1,000,000!!! for Bronze, Silver and Gold contributions to the country's Olympic record. The fund is well stocked as apparently the last medal win for Singapore was in 1963 but given Singapore was part of Malaysia until 1965 I'm not sure it counts.
Anyway, for the next 48 hours I'm a die hard ping pong fan. This is more exciting than the lottery.
Labels: singapore
Olympics coverage in Singapore is a rather sad affair.
Firstly, it consists largely of badminton and table tennis with cursory glances at other sports that Singapore has no hope of qualifying for. Secondly, it only comes on at 11pm for an hour long recap... unless of course you are gainfully unemployed and free to watch the live broadcast of badminton matches at 2:30 in the afternoon.
Watching the success of Singaporean Olympians makes for a rather short telecast so there is also focus on the victories of other Asians and then underdogs in general. But then who didn't rejoice at the triumph of Puerto Rico over the US in basketball? Who didn't besides the Americans of course...
The presenters could, however, probably do better at concealing their glee. After clips of the upset, the announcer said with a huge smile “and stay tuned for more crushing US defeats after the break!”
Well if you can’t rejoice in your own victory, watching the fall of the mighty is the next best thing.
Labels: singapore
I've been in Canada for the past two weeks. Being there was nice... getting there and back was no piknik. I thought it was bad enough that I had to spend 8 hours in JFK waiting for my connecting flight on the way to Toronto... but on the way back, Air Canada got to Newark 2 hours late and I missed my connecting flight. That meant I had to entertain myself at the Marriot Newark for 24 hours as SQ only flies from there once a day.
I took the 19 hour non-stop to Singapore. What a great flight. The "executive economy" seats are a business class hybrid with a spacious 2-3-2 configuration. I mostly watched films and cat-napped. At one point when I awoke, it was night and we were flying over the himalyas. You could see the snow covered mountain tops reflected in the moon light 20 thousand feet below. In the distance, storm clouds shimmered with cracks of lightening. The storm must have been a thousand kilometres long.
I'm over my jetlag now... am also back to myself. The trip home was really a trip. KT had some surprises for me which really blew my mind... I can't reveal her secret though until she's ready to tell the world.
Labels: travel
