Extracted From Xiong's Blog

Extracted From Xiong's Blog

I'll say a lil' prayer for you.

When I was still a happy-go-lucky JC boy who played football all day long, chit-chat with the Farmers during Geography lectures and go on ‘fishing trips’ with Zak while Mr.Leong was explaining all the theories in Economics, I knew a chap called Ivan.

Ivan was from Wushu and you could always see him wielding Chinese swords outside Lecture Theatre One. Behind those dark framed spectacles, you almost thought Bruce Lee was resurrected.

And with half a year to go before the A-Levels, the Farmers and I met up every weekend nights and slogged till the next morning at Changi Airport’s Starbucks. And there was a familiar fellow Yjcian studying alone at one table too!
We met, we introduced and we became friends.
Everytime when my clique and I were to be studying at the airport, Ivan would be there without fail.
He was a quiet chap but in between those frequent short breaks for trash talking and supper, Ivan would shed away his ‘quiet’ mode and emerged a real joke-machine. He was so full of hilarious antics it made us laughed all the way home.
And when it was time to go home, we would take the train back. He stopped at BoonKeng and I was just 2 stops away. On the way we would talked about the impending A-Levels and our future.
We would always be saying things like, “Eh! A-levels coming liao! Scared a not?’, ‘So how’s preparations?’. “Which Uni you wanna go?’.

After graduation, we had not met. Ivan went to SISPEC and emerged as a Sergeant with dear Zak as fellow instructors at Delta Coy. Zak would mentioned to me about Ivan and his banters which made me laugh a lot. I would always thought of messaging him just to say, “Hi! How have you been?” but I always did not. Telling myself next time would be better. And that drags on for so long, till now I have not messaged him.


But I won’t have the chance anymore.
We won’t be talking anymore.
And I can’t laugh at his witty antics anymore.


For 3SG Ivan Ong has left us as 1SG Ivan Ong.
He collapsed during a run this morning at Tekong and will never recover.

Tonight, I'll say a lil' prayer for you.