44th Annual Pot Games 34

20th ANNIVERSARY

SCC BALI MEMORIAL SERVICE

This year was the 20th anniversary of the Bali bombings which killed 202 people, including eight members of the SCC Rugby Section: Charlie Vanrenen, Chris Bradford, Chris Kays, Chris Redman, David Kent, Neil Bowler, Peter Record and Tim Arnold. At sunrise on 12 October 2022, Rugby Section Members past and present, other Club Members, Members of the General Committee, and attendees from other clubs around the region, gathered on the Padang to remember their lost friends and teammates. Section Convenor Jack Whiskin, Club Captain Murray Wylie and Saptak Santra spoke at the memorial service. Below is the speech that Saptak, who was part of the Bali touring team in 2022, has kindly shared for our reproduction:

I’m honoured this morning to be given the opportunity to say a few words about the players we lost in Bali. The last time I occupied this spot I believe was the 10th anniversary. Many of the Club today never knew the guys that we lost on that tour. I hope in the few moments I have been given to shed some light into them, perhaps in a less sombre way than is traditional, to show that they were guys just like you – people who enjoyed their rugby and the bonding that goes with it, but who were senselessly taken from us before their time. Looking around us today we see death and destruction abounding on the news. In many ways we have become desensitized to it all – which is a very callous way of looking at it. We only stop becoming desensitized when we have a personal connection to it – when it hits closer to home. And for us, on the 12th October 2002, that’s exactly what it did. The Bali 10s was an established tournament on the Asian rugby circuit, arguably one of the most popular and fiercely contested. It was a particular favourite of mine, having been my “virgin tour” when I had first joined the Club in 2000, and been baptized into the traditions of SCC rugby touring. All the teams stayed in one hotel, on the beach and with the pitch just a 5min walk away – separated, both conveniently and dangerously, by the hotel pool and bar. The lack of logistics alone meant this was one of the best tours on the calendar. Such was its popularity that the Singapore Rugby Union always kept this a free weekend in the season’s calendar – as the SCC, Bedok Kings, Bucks and Wanderers all competed in it. The tournament started much like any other tour: arrival in the team tent at an ungodly hour on a Saturday morning under the beating hot sun, following a strategic team bonding session the night before, only to see the day’s entire supply of 100plus cans demolished in a matter of seconds. Yet as the sun grew stronger, so did we. The SCC was already undefeated well past the midway point of the 2002 season and in the Bali 10s we were in imperious form, winning every game and not having leaked a single try in defence. As we finished our last game, we were top of our group, having dispatched many of the other tournament favourites. Being one of the larger and slower members on tour, myself together with fellow prop Neil Bowler and Chris Bradford, were the last to leave the pitch bound for the hotel. Our sloth came to haunt us when the figure of Pete “Pot” Taylor of Wanderers RFC strategically blocked our exit route and ordered us back onto the pitch – as certain Wanderers players had gone MIA and they were in need of players to “guest” for them. It speaks much to the camaraderie amongst the clubs at the time that an SCC stalwart like Chris Bradford was to play his last game of rugby in a Wanderers jersey. At the same time, it subsequently helped speed up my own recovery from the injuries I was to sustain – I certainly didn’t want my last game of rugby to have been in a Wanderers jersey!