30 January - End of Week 1

G'day all,

So the first week has been and gone - initiation week - so not really a real training week, but still quite testing and fulfilling. A lot has happened as you might have expected. We get told a heck of a lot of information over short periods of time and are expected to use it straight away. This is done either in practical lessons or lectures - sound familiar to all you uni attendees? The big difference is I'm at work 6am - 10pm, with very little time to sleep on the grass/couch. The culture shock of being told to do stuff all the time and being yelled at was a bit hard to handle at first, but it does have a purpose and a place.

As a platoon we have been working hard on our marching and have just been issued our guns. It's weird to be wandering around carrying a rifle and practicing safety checks on it. We also just learnt how to strip, clean and reassemble the rifle. It's really intense and we've just started doing more physical work, so it's starting to become physically and mentally draining. I threw up on our first physical training session, mainly because I didn't anticipate the amount of sprinting and had a huge breakfast. This didn't sit well...woops.

Apart from that, it's all been pretty good. Actually, most things are like that here - when you're throwing up it feels like it takes forever and is the worst thing in the world, but when you look back on it, it wasn't so bad. The days are now starting to tick over a bit. As I alluded to before, the difference parts of the day feel like they take forever, but looking back on them, they go pretty quick. The worst part of the day for me is waking up at 6am and having to yell HALLWAY 3A at the top of my lungs, while grabbing my sheets and heading out the door. Too much yelling and movement for me. I hate it but hopefully I will get more used to it.

All in all, it hasn't been as bad as I thought it would be, but now that it's got more physical, it's getting slightly tougher.

Hope all is going well for everyone else.

Peace and love from your gun-toting friend.

Posted on behalf of MJ Waters

22 January - The Journey Begins

So, this is the start of a massive journey and what is already an exciting adventure. Sitting on the bus, there is a sense of foreboding; but more overpowering is the sense that I just want it to get underway… as well as a fair bit of sleepiness. This is the beginning of some tough work, but what should be very rewarding in the end. It hasn’t completely sunk in yet, but it’s slowly getting more and more real. At the moment it’s feeling a lot like a school excursion: everyone on a bus, all excited for what’s going to happen when we get to our destination. That part is probably going to be a bit different. I will be updating this throughout the year. I don’t know how I’ll go about updating in the next 2 to 3 weeks. I’ll be doing my best though…

Posted on behalf of MJ Waters