SLC 2023

I was in my school's 2023 Scout Leadership camp and we had to hike to East Coast Park. After we had finished packing our bags for the hike, we were informed that we would be hiking to East Coast Park which was around 9km away and we had to prepare flags for our patrols which were named to constellations and mine was Aquarius which i had a lot of fun designing as everyone was involved in the process of making the flag and it turned out amazing and we were all really proud. As we were leaving for the hike each patrol was issued a tent which was around 7kg and we had to carry it along as we hiked we had to designate shifts for people to carry them as we hiked I was not aware of the time we had spent hiking as I was absorbed in conversation with my fellow batchmates getting us to understand each other more. Thankfully we arrived at the campsite before dark and we had to pitch our tents and cook dinner which was a simple packet of instant noodles but it was a fun experience gathering around one mess tin and sharing our thoughts so far among my patrol mates. After dinner, the ventures had organised a night walk for us and we had to navigate a grassy area with a blindfold on while we held onto each other's shoulders following the directions where our facilitator was at the time I had not realised that my glasses had fallen out my pocket as we had to be blindfolded and I had to remove my glasses and after that, there some teamwork games such as in the dark and picking green beans out of the red in the dark to test our communication skills which unfortunately we miscommunicated and I had put the red beans in the green bean pile. We were also tested on our interpretation as we were given a tent bag and told nothing so we I was insistent on doing nothing by majority vote, we pitched and unpitched the tents but in the end, we actually did not need to do anything and we overthought it. During this time I was without my glasses and I had to adapt to find a way of identifying people such as their voice and body language we then had to wash up and lights out at 2230 and I slept with my patrol with no hiccups.  In the morning we conducted PT at around 0630. We are then unpitched our tents and we conducted a man sweep to find my glasses where we lined up in one line and slowly walked across the grass trying to find my glasses. Luckily one of my batchmates, Nicholas, found my glasses and I thanked him profusely after that day we formed a strong bond as scout brothers. We were then given an activity which was a treasure hunt but with a twist which was we had to collect trash and weigh it against other patrols and we would be given clues to find the buried treasure. In the end, Bin Shan found the treasure. We then had activities such as one where we had to do a simultaneous push-up as our legs rested on each other's shoulders. There was also another activity where we had to plan a fake meeting on a piece of paper. We then had a debrief where we reflected on our journey throughout this scout leadership camp what we have achieved and how these activities brought our batch closer. Overall I would say this scout leadership camp was very fun and insightful in learning various skills and life lessons. I have forged many strong bonds through this leadership camp and I have tested my limits.