When I was in 3rd year High School, I joined the Cadette Officers Qualifying Course or COQC (similar to COCC). I did join it because I thought that it's required for honor students like me and that my brother joined it when he was in his third year high school. At the start, I felt really pressured to be a high ranking officer in the future so I gave 100% for everything even the smallest and most negligible task that even the lowest ranking officer gives. My aspire at first was to be the Corps Adjutant but it changed as I knew more deeply what the different designations are all about and aspired to be either the deputy Corps Commander or at least, a Battalion Commander (1st Bat.). We underwent a fairly tough training but the CAT graduation unconsciously came so fast. My officers graduated (including my brother) and before it begun, we, the aspirants waited for the announcements of the top ranking officers like the corps commander, deputy corps commander, corps s1, s2, s3, and s4. I was really surprised when in the midst of my conversation with some of my comrades, our commandant called me and said I am supposed to be seated at the second chair on the front (on the aspirants side). I was shocked because sitting there means that I will be the next deputy Corps Commander. At the graduation rites, I was one of the few aspirants who received service awards for the Corps.
Then Summer Training came. At the first day, that was Monday, I arrived at school at exactly 4am in the morning yet our commandant arrived ahead of me. I was really shocked about the first words that came out through his mouth which is "anung gusto mong posisyon?" The thing that I was very scared about happened. I was demoted for some reason, Iam sorry to say, I cannot share in this blog. Anyway, there it happened. I was demoted from deputy corps commander to the 1st Battalion Commander. I really regret that it happened because I was supposedly the one who will handle the next COCCs who will apply the coming school year. Fortunately, in the end, it actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise. My fourth year came and my struggle to top our class became even more challenging which resulted in me, being a lot more busy. Luckily the job of a Battalion Commander is very minimal compared to that of the job of the "Dep," which I should have been doing if it didn't happen.
Generally, that was my military experience during high school. Knowing how the CAT military training gave me so many benefits like teaching me how to manage my time, LOSE WEIGHT and get fit, I thought about continuing the military training up to college. When it was our turn to chose what kind of NSTP to take, I had a deal with Cindy (my best"buddy"), that we will take ROTC. Classes started and at the first meeting, I was made aware how different and more exciting ROTC is than the CAT. One factor that made me say this is that in CAT, first thing that we aimed for is a high ranking position while in ROTC, we just choose which special flight to join and graduate on that special flight with other comrades equally. I joined the Honor Guards special flight since it attracted me when sir Fajardo and Ma'am Concina introduced their flight to us. I was unaware at first that my blockmates chose Honor Guards too so I felt delighted seeing them with me (see math? I didn't join sepcial flights because of Cindy).
I was very excited for the next training that because of that too much excitement, I wasn't able to wake up for the 530H training. "What have I done?," I asked myself. At the end of our regular meeting, I was asked by Sir Fajardo if I will continue to be an HG aspirant. He gave me 1 min. and I said YES. He then told me that if I will quit in the middle of the training, my buddy (future buddy that moment) will haveto make 600 push-ups and the other comrades will do 300. I was scared but then I already said yes so I technically don't have a choice and that I really want that cool attire we would be allowed to wear after graduation, the gaila/gala.
ROTC formally started. One thing that I noticed almost instantly was that, the "regular" cadets (we call them regular 'cause they did not join any Special flight nor COCC trainings) do not experience a single hardship. The officers rarely command them to "drop" (this means we're going to do push ups) and do some push ups. The maximum times as far as I can remember that the officers gave for the regular cadets (which also includes us, special flights and COCs) was only 10. But ofcourse, we also had army dozen (it's called army dozen because there are a dozen of exercise repeated a dozen times and this set will be repeated a dozen times) during the regular trainings.
The trainings seemed to be so long but we did not notice that the initiation month for us special flights and COCs was coming up. I was only told by one of my comrades that the next week (relative to this conversation) will be the so-called signature week. In this week, we will all have a signature sheet where there are slots for the everyday signature of 2 of our immediate officers and the 3 highest ranking officers. At the back were the names of the other officers whose signatures are required only once for that whole week. That week, we learned a lot of things. First is that, we must learn to run. Yes. Other officers, specially Maam Domingo whose signature is required to be acquired everyday, run at their top-most speed just to leave us behind with sigsheets unsigned. Everyday was tiring and we almost set aside our acads (academics). I think that was the time when for the first time in my life I failed a Math exam Actually it was not total failure because my grade was D and F is the really failed grade. But still, that was the lowest grade I've ever got in my whole life as an Atenean. Anyway, so much for that horrible memory, I luckily passed the signature week! But guess what? During our special flights training day, that was saturday, our signature sheets were burned! We all shocked because, you know, WHAT THE HECK! we all crammed those signatures, "intel-ed" roughly through google to get the officers' schedules and what do we got? The signature sheets which we planned to put in a nice frame were burnt!
The week after that was called, the disappearance week. But it was actually not really the week after the signature week that the disappearance week was pushed through because on that week, there were two no classes day. Out of evilness, the officers decided to move the disappearance week to the week after that. On that tuesday noon, (2nd to the last tuesday of august), we were instructed to report in the SEC field (an area exposed to a lot of student) in full fatigues. There, we are given commands such as, the Honor Guards should wear adult diapers whenever in school. If a cadet is caught, he/ she will be given 100 push ups on the spot. If he/ she was caught without rifle, another 100 and another 100 if caught without diapers. After saying some other things, the corps commander shouted "SSCCCCRRRRAAAMMMM!" (it meant that were supposed to run until we find an area where any officer would not see us). It was not a tough week for me. I already planned my route when transferring to and from classes in different buildings. If I don't have any class, I would go home in our apartment which was the safest place that no officer can possibly catch me. The five days of hiding were almost over without me being caught when Sir Dycaico, the Wing S-2 Intelligence Officer waited for us during our Electronics 101.1 exam outside the examination room. We (me and my blockmates who are Honor Guards Aspirants) thought that disappearance week was over that night after our exam but when we got out of from our exam, sir Dycaico told us to drop and we did 50 push ups (out of his kindness I think). I really hoped that I was not caught but I realized it was also nice to experience being caught.
After the Disappearance week was the last week of the initiation week which almost made me quit. It was the Costume Week. That week, we we were given a list of the themes or the costumes we have to wear everyday. On that Monday, we were supposed to wear something that reflects our dog names (the names given to us by our officers and mine is Ploning which is Juday's character in an Indie film "Ploning"). Mine was so easy compared to others because Ploning is a real person as compared to others like Daniel whose dog name is Bone/ Paper so he was dressed that day with black cloak all over and some paper made bones with some bones drawn on it. Tuesday was the fruit costume day. Cindy's costume was very good that day because she really looked like a real human apple. My costume was only made by me. I just bought some kind of plastic colored red material which I cut so that it will look like a iant strawberry and I just used garter to wear it. The next day was fun because we wore naruto characters outfits. I dressed like tsunade. I just improvised that costume which is made of two bath robes one green and one white and a normal below the knee pants and a high heeled sandals. I was happy that day because my officer liked my costume. THursday was halloween costume day. When my mother and I went somewhere to find costumes, we only managed to find a black cloak similar to that of the witch's cloak. I just matched it with a witch hat from TOY Kingdom and painted my face with face paints to add more spooky effect. The last day of the costume week came and it was pinoy/ pinay superhero costume day. My mother paid 2000 pesos for my costume that day which is the costume of Kristala which was a fantaserye in ABS-CBN starred by Judy Ann. At 5pm that day, we performed some presentations we prepared earlier that afternoon in a so-called cafeteria raid held in Gonzaga Caf. It was quite embarassing and I heard some people say "Ako nahihiya para sa kanila." But as far as the presentations are concerned, for me we did a great job.
We all knew that that day would not be over soon. RIght after the caf raid, I and Cindy rushed to their apartment where we changed into our fats (fatigues) because that same night was our hell night. The things we did in hell night were unimaginable that is why it's called Hell night in the first place. (Im sorry I cant put more details on this part). But it ended really great. We had a boodle fight (eating in a single piece of banana leaf with rice, noodles and some viands mixed together. prepared by the COCs). We graduated that same night and became the Honor Guards. We were given our HG pin and the dog name tag were burnt too. We were happy that night that we almost did not want to go home.
So that was ROTC training. RIght now, I am an Honor Guard. I not got my Gaila/ Gala which cost is around 6890 from head to foot. It's very expensive but for me it's worth the money because of the coolness it will give me once I got the privilege to wear it in front of a lot of people, including the Ateneo Administration people.
