Life In National Service

Sarguru Hari Om,
It is 1st January 2007, everyone is excited celebrating NewYear. The atmosphere was filled with lots of joy, fun and laughter. In the midst of that, there were some souls crying silently, forced to leave their best buddies, caring family and home sweet home on the name of National Service (NS).

In the beginning I was looking forward to it but as time passed I was reluctant to leave. I was in the bus at 9a.m. As the bus left, I could see tears rolling down my mother’s cheek. My heart sank but I waved with a smile, hoping it would comfort her some how or rather. I made no friends in the bus except for the girl sitting right beside me. It’s not that I’m ignorant but all my thoughts were at home and mandram of course. It was a safe journey for all forty of us.

I reached Kuala Kubu Baru in less than two hours and my place was known as Kem Bina Semangat. I got down the bus and looked at the place which was going to replace my home for three months long. The place was surrounded with mountains. The green sceneries had some soothing effect on us. We were away from the polluted city air and I would say it was a smooth start for us. They (the trainers) grouped us into four different companies, Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta. I was in the first company. Competition was high among the four companies as all of us were contending for the best company title.

I shifted three dorms before they finally placed me in one nearest to the forest. It was tiring as I had to drag my luggage with me. I asked the trainer why is it I had to shift so many times and she gave me one flat answer. What you ask me? Integrity of races and that there were too many Indians in the previous dorms. They gave great importance to unity.

Now that I’m done with the dorm, I have another dilemma to solve. Being a vegetarian, what else can I fear? And yes I’m talking about the food. I prayed everyday and had faith in Swami. I chanted Sarguru Sagalamum Sathagaya Swaha without failing a single day and believed that the mantra will do some magic. True enough wonders happened. Even though the commandant of the camp was a Malay man but both his assistants were Indians. They arranged good vegetarian meal for me and forty of my friends. This is something that I can never forget because without Swami’s blessings this is simply impossible in a Malay dominated camp. Some of you might think that I’m just lucky, to those who think so; you will never realise it until you experience it yourself.

Second day in camp was all about socializing. All of us were keen in making new friends, meeting people from different walks of live, culture and tradition. There were trainees from four different states; Selangor, Terengganu, Sabah and Sarawak. Camp was the melting-pot of all the races in Malaysia. We all stayed under one roof as a big family, helping out each other during hard times, shared the moments of victory and equally shared the punishments as well. Guess what it reminded me? The Lakshmi family in mandram. Where we use to stay close to each others heart, sharing every moment of our lives, appreciating every second we spent together.

Days passed by, and our bond grew stronger. We adapted to the NS live style, starting from waking up early in the morning, managing daily tasks the best way and rushing through the tight schedule. No matter what I did, my day was considered incomplete without prayers. It was only through prayers and meditation I obtained the inner strength to cope up with the activities, faced the challenges with courage and most importantly realised what I’m capable of. I recited the protection mantra given by Swami everyday.

The outdoor activities required high stamina and all of us were pushing ourselves to the maximum level. One of such activities is the obstacle course which consists of nine elements. Starting from the monkey rack, Tarzan swing, and seven more physically demanding elements. The spirit to win never faded. Thus, creating a healthy competition among the trainees. Failure was something that everyone feared, including me. There was nothing else in our mind other than winning. That was the mistake we all did, even in real live we give importance to achievements and success but some how neglect the key to it- failure. It is through failure that we learn and equipt ourselves with the essential ‘weapon’ in order to face the challenges in future. In a nutshell, in order to win we have to dare to fail. It is not easy to accept failures but with Swami ‘right by my side’, everything went on smooth.

Throughout my training, I knew that Swami had been there for me all the time. I saw him in my friends when I was emotionally down, I saw him in my trainers who were trying to build us up as good citizens and I saw him in every problem as the solution. I also learned that, instead of telling God how big our problems are, we should tell our problems how big God is. And that would be all the difference that we need to come up in live.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all mandram members for their support, encouragement and prayer. To all the youth, there is one thing that I want to say, ‘you need not be a cultural person, giving importance to tradition and rituals but you can be a spiritual person’. This means, the way you dress and the type of music you listen to shouldn’t be stopping you from contributing your service towards Guru. All that matters when you are doing your service is sincerity. If you have that, don’t let anyone or anything to stand in your way. We can build up a hip-hop generation with religious background. Leading a spiritual live and a cultural one are two different things. Once again, we need not be a cultural person but we can still grow spiritually. Give it a thought. It makes a lot of sense if looked at from a different perspective.
Sarguru Hari Om.
GuTzy Gal.