Welcome Back Yan!

Sleepy and skinny, but home safe and sound.

My feet after a few days of antibiotics and minus 1 toenail

I'm finally back from the famous SAR tech pre-selection course. I must admit that I'm enjoying the couch and have been eating an incredible amoung of food lately. I will try to describe what happened over there to give an idea for the civilians out there that have no clue what I've been through.

The course was 17 days, basically we cover these topics; escape & evasion, and bush survival. We started with 30 guys, and we finished with 23. Most of the guys that quit did it during the first week because it was the hardest. We basically slept about 4 to 5 hours a night because the instructors enjoyed waking us up for what they called "motivational exercises." Usually these exercises started around 2 am and finished around 6 am. For exemple, one night we had to walk to a given bearing with our rucksack on (which weighted about 115 lbs) across the lake. Once arrived, we had physical & practical exams waiting for us. We were constanly being watched and assessed.

Another night we had to run 16 times across the lake where both physical & written exam were wainting for us. During the day we had lots of inside and outside classes where the instructors taught us how to survive from building proper fire, shelter, smoke signals for the aircraft etc. Although we had lots of classes we also did an incredible amoung of push ups. Actually, I have never done so many push ups in my entire life exept during those 2 weeks. Unfortunatly I managed to injured myself halfway through the selection. I never quit! But now I'm pretty beat up.

The second week was more about navigation through the forest and practice of what we learned the first week. Although it was hard life, we didn't have the instructors on our shoulders all the time like the first week. Every day we woke around 5:30 am, ate and got ready for another long day of walking with the rucksack. We had to walk 2 navigational legs every day, each of the legs was about 3.4 to 4km. Sounds easy but remember that I was carrying 115 pounds of equipment including a parachute and it was through the bush with knee deep snow. Once we arrived at our destination we had to cut trees and build a proper shelter with the parachute. That took about 2 hrs to complete.

At the end of that second week, your body is really broken and every muscle hurts. The last 3 days of the selection was called "single phase" and basically the instructors give you a bearing on the map, you walk for about 4 hours and you get through a checkpoint. Once there, the staff search your equipment for any food you have left on yourself. They confiscate everything, from food to juice to vitamins and once the search is done, they give you 6 of what they call survival rations. They are basically candies, each of them is about 500 calories...just enough for the human body to go through in one day. That's what you're going to eat for the next 3 days.

During the single phase, you're by yourself. You are really busy because you have a bunch of taskings to complete before the instructors come and assess your campsite. As every day went buy, I was getting weaker and weaker, simple tasks became complicated and harder to finish. The course is built in order to make you experience the 7 enemies of survivals (pain, cold, hunger, thurst, fatigue, boredom & loneliness) and trust me - I've experienced everyone of them. I realized how much I missed Kim and the baby, and it definitely puts your priorities in life in order.

The last day the instructors came and assessed my camp. Once that was completed I had to walk back to the school, which was about 3.5 km away. I still remember when they helped me to put that rucksack on my back, my heart wanted to explode. That was one of the longest walks ever. I was tired, and hadn't eaten for 3 days. My left leg was swelling and hurt a lot. The infections in my toes were burning and every step seemed harder and harder to do.

Once arrived, its hard to describe how you feel. You are tired but at the same time happy that it's finally over. Did I say over? Hmm, well once you arrived, the final written exam was waiting for you in the classroom. The staff purposely turn on the heat in that classroom just so you could easily fall asleep. That same night, the selection was over. We all stank because we hadn't washed for 2 weeks, and I lost 11 pounds. But I gotta tell you, what an accomplishment! It was by far the hardest course I have even done in my life, and now I'm enjoying every single aspect of civilized existence, especially the couch!