Many things and activities in S'pore require licenses. You are required to get a license if you buy a TV or a hi-fi set, and this even extends to a car stereo. You are also required to get sort of a license if you want to golf in S'pore. And of course, you also need a license to operate any motor vehicles, and that includes power boats and jet skis. In order to "maximize" my experience in S'pore, I decided to sign up for power boating course as my very first activity. Supposedly power boating is one of the most popular activities in SDU. I consider myself to be quite lucky. I know people who got it only after several tries and there are those who simply gave up trying after a few futile attempts. I was quite overwhelmed by the selection of activities offered by the SDU. They offer cruises, courses, seminars and other social activities. But the only catch is that you are only allowed four activities per quarter.
I wanted a power boat license for several reasons. First, you don't need a COE to buy a boat or a jet ski, and there is no road tax. Now I just have to convince people to build more canals in S'pore 8-) Secondly, since I am fairly outdoor inclined, driving in a speed boat around S'porean sounds like a fun thing to do. And lastly, I just wanted to add one more license to my ever growing S'porean souvenir license collection 8-) To get a power boat license, there are a few things you need to do. First you need to attend a certified course from a yacht club. Then you have to pass the practical test on boat handling. And finally you have to pass the gruesome one hour theory, rule and regulation examination. Then you can apply for your personal power boat license.
On the first day the entire group met at the Yishun MRT station. After four months in S'pore, this was my first time at Yishun. It is supposedly a city within a city with its own movie theaters, shopping district and all the amennity that comes with a city. I didn't get a chance to do much walking around. But I did manage to go to a Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. Their doughnuts in S'pore cost S$.90 each. And when I was there, it was exact change only! Nice way to do business. On the way to the yacht club, we passed under the new MRT line that's currently under construction. Should be interesting to be able to take MRT directly into M'sia one day.
The course was held at SAF Yacht Club at Sembawang. It's located in a camp on the most Northern edge of S'pore (or for Annie, the most upper part of S'pore 8-) Right across the Straits of Johor, you can see M'sia very clearly. The strait is quite deceptive in a sense that it's more like a river with the funny salty sea water smell. We were given the Port of S'pore Authority (PSA) pleasure craft handbook. In order to pass the written exam, you have to know the material from cover to cover. We had mostly class session on the first day. I was kind of disappointed since I had all my gears ready to go out to the boats. We had buffet bar-B-Q for dinner, self cook and service style, of course. It seems like there are people there just for the license and don't care one bit about the social activities. From my point of view, if I can get my power boat license, make some new friends and have some fun in the meantime, what else can one ask for?
On the second day, the class continued promptly at 10am. This is one of the few times I needed to wake up early on weekends. From where I live to Yishun took about an hour by MRT. From there we got a ride into the camp. I was kind of surprised by the lax of security at the Sembawang camp. My guess is that it's not an important military installation. The morning session covers chapter seven of the handbook. This is the most important part of the course. It contains the regulations for preventing collisions at sea. In S'pore, you have to stay on the RIGHT (or starboard) side of the channel, which is counter intuitive to most S'poreans but it suits me just fine 8-) After the lunch buffet, the entire class was divided into group for the practical test on boat handling. I guess this means the theory test is totally impractical 8-)
The afternoon is the best part of the entire session. I was with a group of seven including the instructor. Other than driving the boat around in a prescribed manner, there are two basic maneuvers we are required to perform - pick up a man over board (MOB) and docking. In the first one, you are required to maneuver the boat to within 3 meters of the person or object without hitting it. In the second one, you are required to dock the boat and be stationary in respect to the jetty. If you are taking the course in the future, don't be the first or the last. Being the first, you can't learn from other people's mistakes. And being the last, the pressure is on you to perform flawlessly. Being the gentlemen that we all are, we let the ladies go first 8-) As luck would have it, I was the last to go for the first test and first to go on the second and last test. Having handled a power boat before, I decided to give it full throttle during the MOB maneuver which prompted the instructor to question "Are we in a hurry to go somewhere?" which led me to slow down for the rest of the test 8-( By trying to be cocky, I decided to approach the dock at a greater angle than the recommended 15 degrees. I thought that was fairly impressive until a lady showed us a perfect docking technique with her very first attempt which destroyed all the men's ego on that particular boat at that particular moment 8-(
There were definitely more socializing on the second day. Met quite a few people from other companies. The group was fairly diversed. We got people from ISS, Siemen, S'pore Airline, Tat Lee Bank just to name a few. Of course, there was one doctor in the group. Needless to say, he got most of the attention 8-( We hope to organize a power boating trip after everyone pass their exam. I will be taking the written exam this coming Saturday. Supposedly there are only nine sets of exam questions which means you are almost guarantee to pass it after the 9th try. Being in S'pore for only a couple of months, I am a bit concerned about my knowledge of S'pore's hydrogeography. Hopefully the test will be easy. If you see a future report of power boating cruise around S'pore in this series, you will know I have gotten my license 8-)
p.s. In case you are wondering where part 16 is, I am still in the process of writing my Bali excursion. Hope to post it some time this week.
06/06/94
