Before the event, the parents got together with the Club and decided to organise a
children’s sleep-over at the Club from Friday night through to Sunday. This attracted 36
SAFYC sailors and some parents fussing over us.

Come 30 March, Friday, I rushed home from school to prepare for the SingSiam Regatta
and the sleepover. I arrived at the Club at about 6.30pm, dumped my belongings in the
Function Room and joined the welcoming dinner for the RTN sailors. I was looking
forward to meeting the Thai sailors, as I have only been sailing with Singaporeans so far.
After dinner, we got into our groups (I was in the Brown group), sat down on the ground
to design our group poster and to think of a group name. We also thought of our group
cheering performance. Amazingly, the Brown group – we called ourselves ‘Optimisers’ –
won a prize! After all the fun, we retired to the function rooms.

It was Saturday and the race day! After breakfast and two hours’ of free time for all, it
was time to race. Though we set out without any problems, the wind was not strong
enough during Race 1. Race 2 was the best! A good strong wind blew. I had lots of
surfing and planing. After the race, we went back to shore and had a pot-luck dinner
organised by our parents. After dinner, it was time for games! We played five games, but
all I could remember was playing the longest line and the ‘flour sweet’ game, whereby
we have to use our mouths to pick up sweets buried under a big pile of flour.

The next morning, my friends and I woke up bright and early. We went to check out the
sails of the National Squad sailors. After that, we changed the settings of our sails to
match theirs. A CAT 1 warning was sounded when the race was about to start. It did not
last long though. We set out for the race soon after. My goodness! The wind was very
light.

Wind in Singapore can get quite cranky at times, blowing hard one day, totally gone the next. Despite the ‘tough’ sailing conditions, we managed to complete three races for the day. After we came back to shore, we went for our Prize-Giving Dinner and we took many photographs of all the sailors for keepsakes. We exchanged presents with the Thai sailors and I received a lot of beautiful souvenirs. It was great fun having participated in the SingSiam 2007. I am really looking forward to going up north to Sattahip for SingSiam 2008!