Hello everyone! Sorry for the lack of beauty updates. I’m still waiting for my MAC parcel to arrive. Once it’s here, I’ll do a review on lipsticks 😀 For now I shall do some life updates!
Thanks to my aunt, I had 4 tickets to the preview of National Day Parade (NDP) for last Saturday. If I’m not wrong, it was the first preview for the public. I’ve been to NDP previews at the old National Stadium and the Padang but never to the one at the floating platform, so this year was different for me!
Photo by boyfriend
As my parents weren’t interested in the NDP, I invited boyfriend’s parents to come along with us! It was also his mother’s first time attending so I guess she was quite excited to go as well!
Anyway, no entry time is stated on the admission ticket, I think. But from my experience, the parade usually begins somewhere between 5.30pm to 6.00pm. However, it was already packed with people by the time we arrived at 4.00pm (when entry points are officially opened). By 5.00pm, the crowd of people outside waiting to be seated would be ushered to the gallery (free seating). The middle top rows are usually reserved for the motivators.
There are two entrances (1 and 2) to the gallery. Entry 1 leads to the Blue, Yellow and Red sectors while entry 2 leads to the Green and also the Yellow and Red sectors. This year’s fun pack comes in a backpack in six different colour combinations, one of which includes my favourite colour pink, but not all colours were available at both entrances 😦 There were only the orange and green combination from where I entered so I was pretty disappointed 😦
But like every year, the fun pack has everything you need to keep your stomach satisfied throughout the 3-hour performance. There’s also a poncho in case of bad weather. Of course, the auntie in me was more concerned about this year’s discount booklet! Haha. Quite a number of good deals in there.
What’s in the fun pack!
Close up of the goodies! Do note that this is not the complete set as I had drunk one of the beverages 😛 There’s also a packet of Khong Guan biscuit but somehow it’s not in my fun pack.
Beverages excluding a packet of lemon barley
My new favourite tidbit is the yellow packet of cheese crackers! It’s damn nice omg I’m gonna stock up some of this at home! Bad news for my waistline 😦
Here’s what happened during the parade 😀
P5 students attending their NE show. I reckon my seating area was for schools in the north-east region because schools like Edgefield Primary, Mee Toh School and Compassvale Primary were there!
Boyfriend and I! We were approached by some NDP volunteers to take a picture and I’m supposed to post it up on Instagram and hashtag them. But I can’t seem to remember their hashtag. Anyone?
Hossan Leong was one of the host. Probably because it was one of the first few rehearsals, the hosts looked quite unprepared, always referring to their handheld notes when talking haha. The crowd was a little dead that day as well 
Tattooed my arm!
The simulation of the MPs’ arrival never fails to crack me up! The people holding the MP banner occasionally put up funny faces for the camera.
And here comes the red lions! One of them was a female 🙂
My favourite part of the parade – the marching contingents! I was part of the Girls’ Brigade in my secondary school but was never good enough for NDP 😦 Inspection was not done by our president of course, but by someone of high rank from the organising committee I think.
In the past, after the marching in, the choir would start performing some National Day songs but strangely for this year, there wasn’t any choir at all! I’m not sure why but could it be because there isn’t any theme song this year? Nonetheless the whole parade felt very odd and quiet without the choir. Why oh why did the organising committee remove them?
At this point, we sang the national anthem. I hadn’t sung it for a LONG TIME! Singing it gave me a huge sense of pride 🙂
Flypast routine by our fighter jets
Showcase of Singapore’s military vehicles.. all of them looked sparkling clean O_O
More of our military vehicles… on the waters!
Coloured smoke! So pretty right? I think it was made by the cannons.
Our firefighters and a simulated fire scene.
The closing performance. At this time, some people started streaming to the exit. Haha
One of my best fireworks shots that night! All pictures were taken using my phone by the way.
More fireworks!
These are the highlights of the programme! As you can see, it’s nothing spectacular. If you didn’t manage to get the tickets through balloting and are intending to purchase the tickets through other means, I’d definitely advise you against the idea. Save the money for next year’s NDP as it will be Singapore’s 50th year of independence. Thus for that reason, I’m very certain the organising committee would have better plans in store (they probably saved the better ideas for next year, making this year’s parade a little dull haha).
I really, really hope to get tickets for this year though! My luck in balloting hasn’t been good at all 😦
That’s all for this post! Thanks for reading 🙂
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