37th SSEAYP 2010 - A Sweet Birthday & Myanmar Night

Day 17 - 10 November 2010

Minutes after Night Call the last night, Parveen & Ethel wished me a happy birthday.

While taking a shower, heard Jed's voice calling for me from outside the cabin. Thought I was late and hurried myself to see Jed smiling and wishing me a Happy Birthday. What a pleasant surprise!

During morning exercise, I managed to have a dance with Mortal! (As we walk to the left & we walk to the right, as we walk, as we walk, as we walk all night~) I remember Dewi telling me that Mortal walked over for the dance to be possible. Haha!

Received the first item from Mortal in my letterbox (usually Mortal would reply to me in her letterbox) and it turned out to be a Birthday card. Wondered if Mortal already discovered my identity.

♥

Jun Yi gave me a Men's Pocky (from Japan) as my birthday gift :D

After morning exercise, I was told there was a Solidarity Group (SG) breakfast. At the table, SG A mates sang the Happy Birthday song. It was heartening and sweet of them.

Birthday greetings from Solidarity Group A

The National Leader on duty for the day was Singapore NL Desmond. During morning assembly, he told us that we were already 17 days into SSEAYP, reminded us that this was already our 7th day on board Fuji Maru.

 ♥ Hmmm, 36 days more to go... ♥

During the Discussion Programme (Group Discussion IV), my dear DG members sang me a lovely birthday song.

DG Youth Development discussed about Leadership, beginning with Facilitator Jay asking us to take our "hats" off. We did some activities on "Communication", one of which involved us arranging ourselves according to our birth dates without verbal communication. Miscommunication results in misunderstanding; low performance; and erroneous implementation of duties.

Next, we had a fashion show, using mahjong paper, some tapes and markers to design the outfits for our models. In each small group, Jay appointed one member as the observer who would share the observations after the session.

DG School Education paid our DG a visit and we had an exchange session. 1 member of each DG is paired to 1 member of the other DG. My partner was Khai (Malaysia) and we shared our opinions on "Should schools be the starting point to create young leaders?"

So what's the difference between "leader" and "leadership"? Well, a leader is one person but leadership should be in everyone. Leadership is also the process of social influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support of others in accomplishment of tasks. There are 3 main structures of leadership: Organisation, Leaders, Followers.

Jay also shared about the difference between leadership and management, leader and follower, as well as demystifying the myths about leadership.

He listed the 7 top leadership mistakes: Neglecting members; Unable to handle criticisms; Unable to delegate responsibilities; Knowing everything (hence not wanting to learn); Procrastination; Lack of Focus; Fear of change.

Inspire. Involve. Inform.

"The measure of a leader is to train somebody to be greater than you"

We were given our first DG Assignment: Give a 5 minutes creative presentation on "With all the problems in our community, how can youth create a change in the community or area?"

Myanmar dishes were served during lunch. After lunch, we had SG Activity. 

First, it was the Rope Skipping. All ~30 of us in our respective SG share a skipping rope and had to clock as many complete jumps as possible. SG-A = 0 jumps haha!

Then, we had the ball game...

Administrative Staff playing their own games

Seasickness

During SG Activity, had the chance to talk to Mortal :D

We wrapped up the activity with each SG sending a representative each to compete in the "Best laughter", "Best Sadness", "Most Sexy Dance"...

Administrator & National Leaders as judges

There was a Contingent Meeting, in which fellow Singapore Participating Youths (SPYs) sang Happy Birthday song for me. Didn't expect that to come, and was exceptionally touched. And then before I could complete savouring the moment, I was attacked...

It was a bad timing since I had just taken my bath!

Thanks Sin Yan for the help!

Sha (Philippine) would sing Happy Birthday to me whenever she saw me for the next few days.

It was coincidental that muffin cake was served during dinner.

Our location as at 7pm

Min (Myanmar) lent me his traditional costume for Myanmar Night.

Japan National Leader (also my SG NL) Waku-T was so cute (or "cartoon" as I would say) to put on luminous wristbands on me. He said it was a tradition for the birthday boy to don something that makes him stand out from the rest. They definitely made me stand out in the dark Pacific Hall...

As Min was busy with the preparation for Myanmar Night, I managed to wear the costume myself and I thought I wore it right, but I was wrong. At the entrance to Pacific Hall, the Myanmar Participating Youths (MyPYs) were shocked to see my bottom clothing. I looked at mine and then looked at the Myanmar ladies and then immediately realised how wrong it was.

After wearing the bottoms the right way

Miyako in Myanmar outfit

And let the show begin:

Flags of Myanmar

Myanmar NL making a grand entrance

Dancing to the catchy tune of "Beautiful Myanmar"

Humorous Dance

With Naing, a member of the ruling party

With DG mates

With SG mate

With Nan

♥

With AB (Lao)

With Gangway Partner (wearing Vietnamese Ao Dai)

With Buddy (wearing Vietnamese outfit)

With Korn (Thailand)

With Atchan (Japanese wearing Cambodian outfit)

With Weiwen (wearing Filipino outfit)

Myanmar outfits~

I thought the surprises for the day had ended. The real surprise came when I made my way back to cabin! Folded paper hearts with messages from fellow SPYs!!!! The hearts would remain there till the end of SSEAYP, brightening me up whenever things weren't smooth.

Thanks SPYs for the sweet memory!

At about 10.20pm, Parveen and Ethel came by to share some Tokyo Banana as birthday gifts. How could I survive SSEAYP without my lovely SG-mates.

Sijie and Jiale bought me Häagen-Dazs ice-cream (sold at a vending machine on board)!!!!

Jiale also shared some tips on wooing girls. Haha! 

Still kept the spoon as a souvenir :))

This was certainly the best Birthdays I had in my life. Hope my wish comes true...

Received a weird phone call requesting for something even weirder. Fortunately, I wasn't tempted to it and I was safe. Someone else wasn't.