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Ever since I was
young, I had all along suspected that I might be suffering from autism.
I have difficulty in expressing myself and I need to spend a lot of
extra effort putting thoughts into words, whether in class or at home.
As a result of this shortcoming, my schoolmates started making fun of
me every day. To make matters worse, I was only given 5 cents’ worth of
pocket money by my parents daily and this is not even enough to buy a
cup of drink. I needed to save for 5 days in order to buy a bowl of
noodles. Life was tough when I was young and most of the time we only
get to eat porridge with soy sauce. Hence, a balanced diet was
definitely not in my dictionary then. For six years in the primary
school, I led an unhappy life. After school, I would help my family in
the farm till evening and I only had a bowl of porridge to look forward
to. This has a deep impact on my character molding and I must admit
that ending my life was always in my mind. The only thing that held me
back was the fact that I couldn’t bear to forsake my mum.
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Since young, I always
envied students who were active in sports. Due to the heavy workload on
the farm, my parents didn’t allow me to sign up for any sports event in
school. However, even if they did allow me to sign up for any sport, we
would be too poor to afford a pair of shoes (what more sports shoes!) for
the sport in school. I picked up a lot of courage to sign up for the
first sports event when I was in secondary 3. Consequently, I discovered
that it didn’t cost a single cent to sign up for table tennis and I must
admit that I really enjoyed it for the next 2 years. Subsequently, I made
a promise to myself that I must learn all kinds of sports without
incurring any expenses. Till date, I hold licenses for scuba diving,
pleasure craft, skating, ice skating, golf and most of the ballgames
without paying for them, as these were acquired via the route of being a
Naval officer (NS). I was told that I was one of the first few full time
National Servicemen to be given this opportunity to learn diving in the Naval
Diving Unit in the Singapore Navy, even though I had first started as a
non swimmer.
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Every year, I will
participate in some competitions as a way to motivate myself to stay
positive, to maintain a positive image, and to keep fit and healthy. I
have participated in manhunt pageants like: “Man Hunt Singapore 1992/3”,
“Mr Poly”, “Men we love”, “Female 50 Gorgeous people 2004”,
“Men we love 2006”
and “R u men’s health enough
2007”. The 5th contest saw me as the winner of "R u men’s health enough 2007”.
A benefit derived from these contests is that they help me to learn
more about myself and about my weaknesses. Furthermore, they taught me
an important lesson that the contests are never about winning, but
rather about “the change in the world I want to see". It is not
about failures, only feedbacks.
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Besides these
contests, I have signed up for competitions like Marathons, Biathlons
and other sports events on a yearly basis. I have also achieved at
least Silver standard and (most of the time) Gold standing in IPPTs.
Every year, I look forward to getting the money sponsored by the SAF to
keep fit. I spent about $200 to $400 every year from the IPPT on gym
memberships or visiting swimming pools.
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One of the goals in my
life is to look forward to taking part in sports events like golf, basket
ball, soccer, skating, scuba diving and wind surfing with my wife, my
children and my friends even when I turn 60 or 70 years old. I am doing
my best to maintain my physique. I recovered from hyperthyroid in 2001
but was diagnosed with hypothyroid about 5 months ago. However, this
doesn’t stop me from exercising and contributing to our society.
These bouts of illnesses only tell me that I need to treasure everyday of
my life and to live it to the fullest.
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refer to my schedules for more
details...
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