Nowadays, the contractors have become more and more “garang” (hardworking). You’d never believe they’d stay back for work until near midnight. I don’t know if I should curse or praise them when I’ve to stay along with them.
It’d be cruel for me to chase them away when their project was going to be due soon. I could have just called the guardhouse and rifled men would be sent up. Contractors weren’t allowed to stay until 7pm, but even the guard commander didn’t know their existence in the camp.
I stayed in the theatrette since before lunch to hear them drill holes through the about twenty centimetres thick wall. The impact was so big in the enclosed small control room. I told them I had to leave by 6pm for my duty and the workers packed up before their boss came back. I thought that was the end of my day.
Just when I was leaving the office, the contractor’s boss came in and said they were in a rush and had to open the theatrette. I opened until six and told them I had to leave immediately, and stupidly promised I’d be back at around 6.45pm. Meanwhile someone had called Jonathan to say they needed a room and I rushed down to issue it.
Down at the P.A room, cold sweat started to penetrate out from the skin’s pores; once again, someone had dismantled the cable drums. However, setting up the sound system was smooth and fast when the equipments were still available in the room.
Halfway through, I was call upon by an officer, who tried to help 2LT Daniel Tan to borrow laptop. I finished the guard mounting steadily and rushed back to open up the theatrette again. It was at 7pm when the contractors decided to go for dinner and told me they would be back in half an hour’s time. I rushed down to the specs mess and it was already closed. Since I didn’t drive, it was impossible for me to leave the camp and return in time, thus had to skip my dinner when I was already having gastric pain two hours ago.
Actually they didn’t deserve to be helped. They were late for twenty minutes. Only one of them was friendly, behaving more like a teenager in his 35th year of life; the other three didn’t care to smile at me even though I had tried hard to make myself look pleasant in my shabbiness.
As for politeness, they could have, same like other contractors, asked if I’d need them to help me get dinner or, at the end of the day, a ride at least to the MRT station – they didn’t. What made me hang on was the fact that the theatrette had to be done somehow, not for the sake of AVA or TRMS, but SI – I regretted though.
Just when I was about to leave camp, Jonathan and Shengyang were on their way down on cab. I didn’t like to trouble others so much; no doubt it was good to know others were concern about me.