Hi guides! 
Our year 3s have recently completed the COJ! It stands for Combined Obstacle Journey, where the guides and scouts are faced with various obstacles and difficulties and make use of their guiding and scouting skills to overcome them. It was one of the milestones in their guiding journey and we congratulate them on the successful completion! It was planned by the year 4s and acts as a prelude to PLTC, which stands for Patrol Leaders Training Camp. Both of these are geared towards making our girls better leaders so that they can take up the mettle when they step up to lead. 

Below are two accounts from our guides about their experiences during COJ. 


From a P3 guide: 
Finally, the long-awaited COJ arrived on 7th April. We year threes have spent a while preparing for it, and most of us felt prepared enough and were anticipating Saturday after inspection on the 4th.

During inspection, we had a surprise “test” which involved pouring water onto our haversacks to check if they are properly waterproof. This “test” had made all of us more aware that we must be prepared at all times, and to ensure that all our things are in order in case of emergencies.

During the preparation period, my patrol, P3 Rubber Ducky bonded well together as we discussed our identities, patrol songs and cheers together. We were able to communicate among ourselves pretty well, and this would help us throughout COJ. 

My patrol’s first station for COJ was the obstacle course station. Generally, we felt that we could have had more communication between the patrols so that we could complete the whole course. Nonetheless, we cheered quite a lot which helped to boost our patrol’s morale and we tried our best. 

Our next station was the survival skills station. We were asked to build a signal fire, as well as build a structure to elevate the whole patrol. Throughout the activity, the seniors gave us a few drills such as bear attack and wild boar attack. Unfortunately for us, we could not get the fire started and only managed to start two out of three. Also, we did not manage to allocate the manpower efficiently so there was some point where a particular task was left with too few people to cope with. 

    Our third station was PT as well as pitching a dome tent and I was the PL for this station. We were also being tested on our Guides code as we ran around finding the logistics needed to pitch the dome tent. Overall, our patrol’s stamina was not bad. However when it came to pitching the dome tent, I was not that calm anymore. My patrol mates were blindfolded, leaving me to guide them. It was rather difficult to give them instructions and I started to panic. Halfway through, I swapped with the PS but we still could not finish the tent in time. I felt that I should have been clearer and should not have panicked, as it would be of no use. 

 

The fourth station was acid river, where we were supposed to build a structure to transport the patrol from one end to another. However, only four people could tie the structure while the other three had to ding boy’s style, and we could only swap every five minutes. Due to the lack of communication between the people tying and the people ding-ing, there was a lot of confusion every time we swapped. We could have improved in that aspect and ensured that everyone had a clear idea of what’s happening. Because of that, we ended up exceeding the time limit many times and we still failed to transport everyone over in the end.

Our fifth station was the vertical rope station. While some people had to climb the vertical rope to get six post-its with the Guides code and decipher it, some of us had to treat a wounded patrol mate. We managed to get all six post-its as we tied our green spar to the rope and got different people to retrieve them. After that, we had to transport our casualty up to the second level but we could not think of any way to move him up, so we failed that part. 

Finally, we reached our last station, which was the gas room station. We took the necessary precautions, such as covering our mouths and noses and crouching low. We took a while to switch off the gas and treat the two casualties. Unfortunately for us, our first aid pouch got confiscated so we had to make do with the two bandages we had on with us before we moved the two casualties out of the room, and there was nothing much we could do since we did not have enough bandages. The next part of the station was to build a stretcher and then transport one person from our patrol as many rounds as we can around the block. We cheered rather constantly as we jogged around the level, but we stopped quite a few times to make sure the stretcher would not give way. We could have minimized this and saved some time if we had checked to make sure the stretcher was secure in the first place. Since we had some time after the activity, the seniors gave us an extra section, with a scenario where one of our patrol mates nearly drowned in the pool and was currently unconscious. However, we did not take this station very seriously. We did not really follow the proper steps for CPR, and I felt that we could have done much better for this station.Our patrol got third for COJ, and we were pleasantly surprised as we thought that other patrols might have done much better than us. Overall, COJ was very tiring but an enriching experience for all of us. We bonded together as a patrol and were able to communicate amongst ourselves much better as compared to when we first got to know of our COJ patrols. However, we still have a lot of room for improvement, such as cheering more, brushing up our skills, constant 报时, and communication within the patrol for every station. We also have to remember to take care of all our patrol logistics, and try not to panic so much whenever we are in doubt. Now, we have to improve on all these to prepare ourselves for the upcoming PLTC. 

加油everyone and thank you Year 4s for planning COJ and making it successful!:D


From a guide from patrol 1: 
On 7 April, the Y3s had our COJ. We were all nervous yet excited for COJ and had made necessary preparations beforehand for it.

Our first station was the vertical rope station. One person was asked to be the casualty while the other patrol members were asked to treat the casualty and transport him up with the vertical rope. Also, post-its were stuck on wall of the second level and we had to climb up via the vertical rope to obtain the post-its which had the guides code on them, decipher the message, and do the distress signals. My patrol’s morale was very low and we needed a lot of prompting to cheer. Also, our actions were rather slow and only 2 patrol members could climb the vertical rope. We failed to obtain all the post-its as the same person was not allowed to go up too many times, and we did not make use of the green spar to build a rope ladder as we would get penalized. However, we should have done so as the penalization of marks is better than not completing the task at all. However, we managed to transport the casualty up with the fireman’s chair. 

Our second station was the gas room station and I was the PL for this station. When we first entered the gas room, we remembered to duck to avoid falling objects and also crawl on the floor and cover our mouths and noses. Our patrol lacked communication and we ended up taking quite long to finish our tasks in the gas room. We transported the casualties out before treating them, but did not ask if they could walk and hence had to carry both casualties out instead of supposedly only one as she was supposed to be able to walk on her own. Also, some people were left behind as our patrol did not really communicate with one another and ended up doing our own things, hence the scene was rather chaotic. We then treated the casualties after we left the gas room. One had a rib fracture and we bandaged her rib instead of tying an elevation sling, which is the correct method. The other was unconscious and had a head injury and we put her in recovery position and bandaged her head injury. For the second part of the station, we had to build a stretcher and transport the unconscious casualty as many rounds around the level as we could. We cheered constantly but could have had a greater sense of urgency. At this station, we should have taken better care of our things as our haversack got taken once. Also, we should have had better communication among the patrol and as the PL; I should have given clearer instructions and made the patrol work together to complete the tasks faster and more efficiently.

Our third station was at the obstacle course. We had to cross a series of obstacles to the other side where all our patrol logistics were confiscated and placed. Every time we touched the floor, we had to do 10 sit ups. We passed the first obstacle by crawling over it and we attached a green spar to help us cross more easily where the gap was slightly bigger. Some patrol members passed the obstacle very quickly, while some took very long to do so. As a result, our patrol seemed to be more like two patrols as there were two distinct groups. For the second obstacle, we had to cross over to the other side via a few dangling ropes. Only one person from my patrol managed to cross this obstacle and the others were stuck at the other end. We took very long to decide how we were going to cross the obstacle and some of our methods failed, hence resulting in our failure to cross over to the other side.

Our fourth station was the survival skills station. We were asked to set up a signal fire and build a structure to elevate our patrol logistics. My patrol managed to set up the signal fire (three small fires forming the shape of an equilateral triangle) and make use of the benches and red spar to tie a structure to elevate our logistics. However, we failed to react quickly enough during the hornet and wild boar attacks. We also had to set up three distress signals and build hike tents to shelter our patrol logistics. Our hike tents failed to shelter our patrol logistics as they were not taut enough and immediately sagged after water was poured on it. Our patrol worked rather slowly and we also worked in two distinct groups and did not have communication among one another. We should have worked as a patrol instead of breaking up into two groups and not communicating between the two groups while completing the tasks. Also, our patrol morale was very low.

At our fifth station, we had to pitch a dome tent while being blindfolded (except the PL), as well as decipher messages written with guides code. We managed to decipher the guide’s code quickly and did caterpillar walk and commando crawl to get the logistics required for the dome tent. We did not take care of our patrol logistics well and also left the haversack to the PS alone. We failed to pitch the tent in the end and our actions were also very slow. We also had to cross a pathway on fire and we made use of chairs to help us cross the pathway. At this station, we should’ve had better communication among one another and helped one another out. We also should’ve cheered more to boost the patrol morale.  

Our last station was the acid river. Four people were allowed to build the structure at a time while the others had to 顶in boy’s style position and could only swap after 5 minutes. We managed to get the structure right, but failed to cross the acid river. We took too long building and re-building the structure and there were times when people were not doing anything too. We should have worked faster and used red spars instead of black spars as they are lighter.

This COJ has been an enriching experience for my patrol as we have bonded more as a patrol and learnt new skills. However, there are a lot of improvements to be made such as cheering constantly, working faster, taking care of our patrol logistics more, having better communication among one another, and being surer of our skills. We will try our best to improve before PLTC. Lastly, thank you Y4s for planning this COJ for us! :)

We love guides! :)

Initiatives

Last week was very special as we had initiatives. As compared to normal Guides meetings, where we learn important guide skills, for initiatives, we had the chance to learn a new thing. This helps to diversify our knowledge base and teaches us interesting things that we can do. Below are the accounts from Coy 1 and Coy 2. 

From Coy 1, 

Today, we had initiatives!

Objectives of the initiatives:

1) Learn more about stitching

2) Show that everyone is part of the bigger family; everyone makes a difference

3) Bond as we talk and share our materials

For Coy One, we did quilting which is by stitching fabric together. First, the ICs, Guo Jun and Nicole taught us some stitches such as back stitch. Using the cloth we were told to bring beforehand, we each designed a 20 by 20 cm piece of quilt.

It must have:

1) A base made up of at least 3 pieces of cloth stitched together (using back stitch)

2) Designs added on top of the base

As some of my patrol Yr1s do not have any experience in sewing, the individual patrol seniors guided them in the stitches. The initial 45minutes is then extended to around 1 hour 45 minutes as our progress was very slow. After we are done with our individual pieces, we stitched 2 together to form a connected pair. After that, the y4s helped to stitch all the pieces together to achieve a masterpiece. However, there was not enough time to finish it during the meeting, thus the y4s are going to continue afterwards.

 Then, we started on the second part of the initiatives, toy making. While the y4s work on the masterpiece, we each receive a template of an elephant. Using felt, we cut out the shape of the elephant to stitch a soft toy. There was not enough time to finish though. However, we could have moved faster and focused more so that the quilting can be done in a shorter time, allowing sufficient time for the y4s to work on the masterpiece. 

From Coy 2, 

Today, 30 March was a memorable day for us guides as we had initiatives! 

Being in Coy 2, our patrol did the Pinhole Camera Initiative, and even learned how to take pictures with it. 

Firstly you had to poke a hole on the cover of the shoebox, then cover it with aluminum foil and tape it up, all the while leaving the hole uncovered. 

Next came the small details like making sure the other small air holes on the shoebox was taped up with black paper to prevent light from going in, and making a small shutter with black paper to make sure you only expose the photographic paper to that particular amount of light. 

The really fun part came when we all had the chance to go around taking pictures. Each patrol was given 30 minutes to look for and take pictures. Although we tried our best to keep the shutter open for only 1.5 min -which is the ideal time- all of our pictures were over exposed and turned out black on the photographic paper. Only a few managed to get some form of shape on their photos. 

Even though it was not really successful, it was still a good experience owing to the effort the seniors put in to let us be able to learn some skills that school could not have imparted to us. It was like a step back into the past and we realized the convenience of the digital cameras that we have now and are grateful for it. 

We <3 guides!

Hey Guides!

We had our first obstacle journey, A.K.A. OJ, for the first time this year. It was a first for the Year 1s who recently joined guides and a good exposure for them. OJ covers many of the skills that we learn in guides and it was a time for the Year 2s and 3s to revise their skills as well. It also includes games unique to guides; games that often have a purpose behind them. 

Below is a recount and reflection of a fellow guide on the OJ: 

 

For OJ, we had 5 stations in total. The stations were: 1) Pavilion at 正心园2) PLTC campsite 3) 4H/I classrooms 4) Red tile area 5) Parade square

Our theme for OJ was collecting eggs! :D Pavilion at正心园- we had to cross the electric fence with all our belongings as a patrol, and it was rather difficult as if one touched the string more than 3 times, one would have to restart. We mainly commando crawled over and did "zhan ma" once we got over to the other side. This station made us exercise caution as we would in a real case scenario. The other part of this station was fire lighting, where we had to start a fire and sustain it with our kindling in order to boil the water in the kettle. It was a good eye opener for the new Year 1s and we let them have a try at blowing the fire too.

The station at the PLTC campsite consisted of 2 parts. Firstly, we had to tie a rope ladder and use short spars in order to climb from the staircase down to where there was a mattress waiting. Our mission was to transport all patrol members and belongings down, but due to a lack of time, we failed. However, we still kept our patrol morale high! Following that activity, we then had to proceed to build emergency shelters to keep our "eggs", which were newspaper balls, "warm". For the year ones, it was a learning of a new skill whereas for the year 2s and 3s, it was a refresh of memory and good practice.

The 3rd station was testing us on our skills of knowing how to handle a gas room situation, and "夜里行军" which means patrol members need to be blindfolded. For the gas room, we had to stand to one side when opening the door, in order to ensure that any dangerous objects that fell out would not hit us. When in there, we had to find the switch to off the gas and open up all the windows and doors. After that, we proceeded to another classroom for "夜里行军". The patrol had to blindfold their eyes and go through it while on the way, the PL and PS who weren't blindfolded picked up eggs. After that was PT, which consisted of a short circuit that we had to do, that included planking, pumping, running and jumping jacks. I feel that this PT helped us to bond as a patrol more and everyone persevered. Though it was hard for the year 1s, they made it through.

For the 4th station, we had to build a roman chariot and carry one person on it while we went around picking up eggs. The difficulties we faced were the lack of time and hence when we carried up the roman chariot, we had to hold on tightly to the knots as some were not tight enough. After that we were tested on our First Aid skills, which included us bandaging up a "casualty". Our FAK was taken during that station and it was terrible as it was a first aid station. A flask flood occurred after that and we had to shift all our things up the stairs. We carried the casualty up by hand as we did not think of building a stretcher, which was kind of foolish. However, it was great fun!

Last but not least the fifth station, we were given 2 paths where only one person from each person could run along and we were supposed to reach the other team's side first with all our belongings too. One path was to test us on our guides skills, and if we answered the questions correctly, we could proceed if not we had to turn back. It was really fun, but we had to learn to take care of our belongings better.

We <3 guides!!

Thinking Day 2012

Hello guides,


Happy Thinking Day! Yesterday, girls worldwide celebrated Thinking Day, a very important day to us, together. It is the birthday of both Lord Baden Powell and Lady Baden Powell; the founders of scouts and guides respectively. On this day, the girl guides of Dunman High School put on our uniform for the day, and greeted fellow guides, in a way unique to us, when we see each other along the way.

For this year, the theme is Girls Worldwide Say “We Can Save Our Planet”, which is based on the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goal 7, which focuses on environmental sustainability. All over the world, guides have activities based on the theme, and it is a powerful movement that shows how we can make a difference and help to save our planet.

Over the next few days, guides in DHS will be exchanging gifts amongst our patrol. It is a time honored tradition in which each batch will prepare gifts for the others. The gifts are mostly handmade, sometimes accompanied by a note card with all our well wishes. The value of each gift would definitely be more than the sum of its parts, and it is to show our appreciation for each other.

For the year 4s, it will be our last thinking day, so this is especially meaningful. Hold close the memories created and they shall last for a long time. For the year 2s and 3s, do cherish the time you have in guides and enjoy yourselves. For the year 1s, this is a new thing for you. Just remember that it is the sincerity and thought into each gift that counts rather than the price.

Finally, we wish all guides Happy Thinking Day, and let’s all do our part to save our planet!

HAPPY THINKING DAY!

we <3 guides

Hi guides,

Last week, we had a special party to celebrate two things. Firstly, it was a party to welcome the year 1s into our family; secondly, we celebrated Chinese New Year together, once again reenforcing our strong ties to each other. It was truly a unique party where we bought the raw materials and tried our hand at making our own popiah. The following are reflections by 2 of our year 3s on the day's activity. :)

From P7:
For P7's patrol activity on Friday, the year 2s taught the year 1s to tie the square lash and diagonal lash, while the year 3s built a standard baggage rack. The year 2s got to revise their own skills and the year1s learned the basic skills required to build even more complicated gadgets.
For the baggage rack, we wasted a very long time tying the main frames and made quite a lot of mistakes like not tucking in the loose ends of the strings. However, we managed to finish it within 40 minutes. It was quite an accomplishment for us as we only had 2 people to tie.

Afterwards, we had the Popiah Party which was very fun as we got to make our own Popiahs. It was a unique experience for me as I had never made popiah before. The popiahs were really nice and filling and the feedbacks from everyone were really good. After the party, we cleared up and had patrol corner. It was really interesting as we got to know each other better, and bonded more as a patrol.

From P8:
Today, we had a patrol activity where the year 3s and 2s had to build a kitchen dresser and the year 4s taught the year ones how to tie lashes. We were given 45 minutes to tie the kitchen dresser and so we started off by tying two tripods. We had to re-tie one of the tripods as the lash was too loose but luckily we did not face the problem of unequal legs as we had supported it against a flat surface well enough. We then proceeded to measuring the tripod and tying the supports to it. After finishing the two completed tripods, we tied the diagonals below for stability. We realized that time was running out and so we sped up a little. When we wanted to tie the area where we were supposed to do our chopping and miscellaneous stuff, we realized that we needed more gadget poles. After retrieving them, we continued tying and finally got the basic shape there.

However, not only had we exceeded the time limit but we also did not manage to start netting due to our poor time management. We have learnt from this patrol activity that we must make sure all our lashes are tight, logistics all taken and make better usage of our time the next time. The year 4s and 3s proceeded to explaining to the year 1s the usage of the kitchen dresser. Then, we were given three minutes to untie everything and return all the logistics back to the guides’ room. After that, we ran to meet everyone at the canteen to have our Popiah Party.

we <3 guides