Our "Semboyan Lance Corporal" lit yet another cigarette, one of many that afternoon by which dozens of butts near his feet can bear testament to that. White noise coming from the HF Radio by now has assimilated into the background as we patiently await for a communication breakthrough.
Everyone was quite, sombre, fact is after many hours we have yet to receive any contact from the other side and I began to wonder what on earth is going on in the field. Maybe it was raining, maybe a blind spot but whatever it is I'm not going to call any more as my mobile phone bill had hit the ceiling.
It was then when Tok Mat dropped by, perhaps after looking that the young uniformed corporal he felt nostalgic, or maybe our insanely bored face prompted him to share his commando stories.
"So you were with PASKAU? (Pasukan Khas Udara)" Asked the Corporal
"Yeah I was, but it was a very long time ago when I was young, before you guys were even born, ahahahaha man I'm old. I was one of the first few batches you see."
"So what was the training like Tok Mat?" I inquired
"Well basically it was crazy, took me a while to assimilate back to society after that, they really brainwashed us good, not that it's a bad thing or what, after all we were trained for war and being a commando is mostly about operations behind enemy lines, so you know what it's like if we were caught by the enemy, but slowly after that we learn to intergrate and mingle with society."
"What do you mean by crazy, tough training?"
"Well tough training is one thing but more like crazy things, like this one instructor we had,."
"His name was... I can't remember but we called him Mat Kedil, you see every morning while the recruits were doing their push ups, Mat Kedil would walk to one recruit, randomly picked, different one each day, unzip his pants and does his morning routine piss on that fellow's head, suppose to test our mental"
"Holy crap! What did you felt when he pissed on you?"
"Well, as I can remember, it was warm."
"That was a long time ago, he is probably dead by now, the last time I heard about him was that he was wandering around his hometown with his mind going all bonkers, crazy, lost his head completely."
"The training was tough huh? Mentally?"
"Not really, after all he was the one doing the pissing, plus most of us turned out okay."
"Oh what happened? He got into an accident or something?"
"You see, imagine this, every morning he would piss on someone's head, every day during training season and each of the person he pissed on would curse him in their heart. Now you imagine how many people cursed him on a training season, hundreds maybe, say it goes on for 10 years, thousands of curses was thrown to him by thousands of different individuals."
"You're saying that he gone crazy because was cursed?"
"Sort of, you see there's the Malay saying that goes, if you say the same thing for more than 40 times it becomes a prayer."
"So?"
"Maybe, those curses, by which for the same reason, after so many times over became a prayer, perhaps god answered that prayer."
"But those recruits didn't pray any harm for him, plus isn't it forbidden to do so."
"Well, prayers need not necessarily be in it's literal form, a thought or a wish can be a form of a prayer after all. Which is why, those who help others always find themselves some sort of happiness even in the most dire situation, because of the kind wishes and thoughts that came from those who they had helped hence they are always blessed."
"Praying vehemently is good, but it's better to do good to people, because praying per-Se is a prayer from one person, but good deeds spread and it works both ways you know, it's the same for sins."
"I mean if you keep saying that 'I have no money to buy this or to do that because I'm poor' again and again and again when you're not really, perhaps someday god might grant you that wish"
"So always be mindful of your thoughts, of others as well, for prayers they may be."
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