Concerning the NightWalk, and the Showers (ICT FOC Day 1; Part 4)

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MAY 17, 2005 AT 2.50AM

Suddenly one of the OC members announced that the NightWalk was cancelled ("That is Good News!") There were sighs of relief, as people were rather tired. It was 2.50am in the morning.

Either way, we still had to perform the NightWalk, as our bunks were at the other end of the campus, from where we were congregated. Thus, we instead walked in a huge group, in a sort of mass NightWalk.


Pause. I have just found out why (perhaps) the food was unpalatable. From an undisclosed (human) source, it was found out that for last year's camp, a team of food tasters from the ICT Club sampled each meal personally. They gave their opinions and comments about the dishes, and suitable changes were made to the menu.

However, this year, they did away with the panel of judges; instead, the choosing was based on price. So, the food was bad.

Continuéz.

The mass NightWalk was the exact opposite of what a NightWalk was supposed to be. A NightWalk, for your information, is solitary. Its main purpose is to instill Fear within the walkers, and several methods are used to achieve this result. Other than the solitary nature of the Walk, the next easiest method is to deprive walkers of light. No flashlights are allowed.


Booby traps and terrible items are placed along the route at regular intervals. Most common ones consist of dead bodies, falling or stationary. There are also disembodied heads "floating" on ropes connected to pulleys (silent pulleys, not creaking ones), and the Walkers are supposed to detect by themselves the approach of the head(s), and scream at appropriate points.

Of course a drawback of installing all these apparati would be the screams, indicating to those behind that a booby trap was near, and they had better watch out. How ironic.

The NightWalk was uneventful.

The booby traps were taken down because the Walk was cancelled, if you remember me saying so.

So we reached our bunk. The OC members announced tomorrow's waking time, 11.00am. Then we were permitted to sleep.

My group chose to bathe first. We had already agreed to do so earlier.

Unfortunately the nearest mass showering area was a good 450 metres away (could be more!), and travelling there required the use of a torchlight, since the roads were uncustomarily dark.



Once there, we discovered luxurious showering areas (3 in all) and some apparently so big that they needed two different doors. Of course, the actual *number* of showers were not so luxurious for us campers all at once. Impatient ones whiled away the time walking to and fro between the areas, hoping to find one with shorter queues.

For goodness-knows-what reason the number of toilet cubicles in one of the showers-cum-toilets were equally luxurious. I suppose shower cubicles are in great demand during bathing times, but I can't imagine vast numbers of people coming to use the toilet cubicles (only). Well, for the female toilets, that would be perfectly acceptable due to the eternities spent there, but Really, for the male toilets, put more showers!

The school has an excellent ez-link card payment system for the vending machines. I have tried it. ("It's Good!") There are shortcomings, as usual (what do you expect? It's electronic!)


Average number of showers per toilet: only 5! One changing room (out of 3) could be done away with, and converted to a shower. The Reduction of toilet cubicles goes without saying. Out of an estimated 6, 2 could be converted into showers. Sinks? Put more. Benches? Also. We don't want people standing about expectantly (they walked a long distance to get here, so let them sit and rest!) Also useful for wearing long pants when the floor is wet; they can stand on the benches to do so.

Finally I was back in my bunk. To bed! (sleeping bag rather.) After a long day.