Brian Ashcroft
I can still remember Willie Lawson and Dave Ovens picking me up from the airport when I first arrived in Singapore and asking me if I had packed my football boots. When I enquired innocently about the one week acclimatisation that I was supposed to take, you both said it was an old wives tale and not to worry. Luckily my first game was against the BMH where I was sent the next day to recover. The game was no problem but the mandatory après match crate of Tiger was something new to my constitution. If I remember rightly it was that game that Peaks was shown the equivalent of a yellow card by the ref for smoking at the toss up!!! Lots of us were booked from time to time but never before the kick-off!
15 January 2012
Willie Lawson
The same happened to me. I was picked up by Duncan Giddings and taken to JB Det. On the way he asked whether I had my cricket kit in the cases, when I said yes he told me to get it ready and then drove me back down to Ayer Rajah Road to meet the rest of the team. Within 20 minutes we were fielding against a team from Singapore District and our Aussie skipper Tony McGinty threw me the ball and asked how many slips I wanted! Eight sweaty overs later I was given a breather in the outfield. Like you, the Tiger and Anchor afterwards soon hydrated all of us. Jet lag is for wimps!
18 January 2012
Dave Wakelam
Jet lag is for wimps indeed! After having flown from Heathrow, courtesy of British Eagle, with a draft of 28 Green Jackets bound for Penang, and having been ‘dicked’ to escort an RAF wife travelling unaccompanied apart from four kids under the age of 10, without the privilege of sitting in the Pads part of the plane, I was driven in a four tonner with said Green Jackets to Nee Soon transit camp. About an hour after arriving, we were marched at light infantry pace down to the Far East Training Centre where we spent the next couple of hours carrying lockers, beds, tables etc to the top floor of one of those huge blocks on Meerut Square ready for an incoming Malay intake of LEPs. After a swift F&N in the FETC NAAFI, we were marched back at a more sensible pace to the transit accommodation. We were allowed to go to the Garrison Pool, and I made my first mistake. Thinking my cash would be at risk from a) local ‘Loose Wallahs’ or b) the Green Jackets, I took it with me to the pool where it was removed from my kit by the Argylls. The next day, I was driven in another four tonner full of luggage belonging to the Aussie SAS, en route to the Jungle Warfare School, to JB station where I got the train to Seremban. Arriving at Seremban I was greeted by Jake and Wes McMurphy and driven to McMurphy’s quarter where I received a typical McMurphy introduction to Tiger, which culminated in my vomiting copiously into the toilet whilst watching my glasses slip from my sweaty nose into the vomit. To add insult to injury, on my OC’s interview with Major Ray Collins, he gave me a bollocking for my lack of security in getting my dosh stolen. I then tipped up in front of Ken Bell, the CSM, who gave me the usual paternal Health and Safety lecture about the evils of drink and the necessity of two and a half years of celibacy. Those of you have seen the pictures in the Photo Gallery will get some idea how much notice I took!
