Yixiong asked us seniors and graduated climbers to post a little something about boulderactive during this period, leading up to our 2012 boulderactive. A little something on how organising and being part of this event is what I feel makes me an NUS climber, bringing us all together to work on something spectacular.
Also to revive this little blog here, especially after everythings turned to facebook. I guess coming here already brings some sort of little floating memories and of course I get to type more words here too.
So heres about 5 things about boulderactive that me (as a graduated nus climber) reminisce about:
1) That big lorry that we always load our mattresses and tiles and whatnots onto. Since I came in, it’s the big container truck and not the usual lorry that previous batches take by squeezing in between the mattresses. I mean sure, I never really loaded up a huge ass mother big lorry.. but doing all that saikang with your fellow teammates, actually finding out how much stuff is jam packed into that smelly gym or ours and knowing every little effort counts. That’s team work isn’t it? And that’s the difference between NUS climbers and the other school teams out there.
2) My first BA was in 2009. My first official climbing competition too. It was a novena and that period, it rained. And that little makeshift shovel we made from the board that packaged the new green sloper metolius holds. It was ridiculous but it worked alright. I remember we had 2 climbing towers? And that Sandra got into the open women finals and there were like 2 dyno moves in one single route; which Beatrix both managed to catch and then finished the route like how alex puccio crushes. But no matter how wet the whole event ended, Nigel (who was the organiser then), bought us all haagen dazs ice cream at the end. Even though Gerry and Reg were strict no-saliva-sharing people, it was nice to see all those who were part of this nus event sit down and share that many tubs of ice cream (which melted and finished really quickly).
3) How I started inching my way towards being part of the legendary F1 crew of boulderactive. Haha. Maybe by helping in just taking out the footholds at the bottom, or the starting holds, tearing off the boundary tapes. Helping out in small things like these makes work lighter for the F1 crew, keeps things moving fast. No doubt its scary being at the top of the walls, barefooted, sweaty palms, heavy tile and an allen key trying to find the t-nut hole to screw in the ending tile. Somehow this gets on my nerves more than lead falling.. haha. But I still do it anyways. But when I stop to look, I like how everyone knows what they’re supposed to do, or at least try, and theres this sense of achievement when u see those new routes go up almost instantly the walls are available. You know that no other local school competitions can do it as fast as us, using true blue school helpers. ;)
4) Now, who can forget the pride of clinching champions for the team event, especially when that event is boulderactive ;) no matter how tired each one of us were, we all still fight it out and compete against all other competitors the same way. And when we grab those podiums from each category? Awesome. Dominating the scene, yo. Like a boss, like how a powerhouse school team should be. And I think every nus climber should be proud of that.
You know that orange white polo tees we have from the SRC. I like how we all stand out in the crowd, really identifying ourselves as a school team and being there to support each other during each other’s category. The moment an nus climber comes out to climb, this mass of orange and white starts to stand or hover around, cameras whipped out, voices raised. And people will know that that’s who they’re supporting. Look at the numbers we have in our team, far more than any other school. Yet we were so bonded, we knew each others favourite food at least! HAHA. Yu pian tang (with extra bowl of rice)? Or Indonesian panggang.
5) Being an nus climber is not just about being there to help out during the event. It was about meeting up for lunch and TALKING, psyching each other up many weeks before the actual event. It was contagious! Especially when you’ve got bert, hh, des, yixiang and jw on one table. And then theres doris and yixiong, jansen on the other. And then the people from rvr join in one by one. And then suddenly we have like 4 tables full of climbers eating (the same thing?) and talking about what we love best. We talk about how training has been going for us, who has what injury, whos gonna be competing in opens, etc. we discuss on the perfect, power team to own everyone in the team event. We wonder about what the isolation is like. We discuss competition tactics. Its not just a seasonal thing. Its almost every day! That I think that’s what I miss the most now. :p haha.
So theres my 5 things. That’s not all to my nus climber life.. but its enough to keep me wanting to turn back time to experience it all over again. I cant wait for this next boulderactive. I heard its gonna be legendary, just like how the previous comps are. And how everyone always looks forward to it. Like how it’s the competition of the season. And I cant wait for it to come, so that I can once again be part of it, even though ive graduated. But maybe I want to stick my busybody head into it and revel in how its like being part of the team again. Aww.
Im good at arrowing people. But this time I really must. So jiawei, can you do the next write up? XD
