February sapper mag:Layout 1 21/1/09 16:13 Page 17
on a back board with five components
that the kids would have to assemble.
als from the North East who would The pipe jigsaw was a combination of
actually enlist. plastic and copper pipes that joined
ACE next moved onto Bassingbourn. together to create a snake.
With plenty of real estate the RE Trade The first location was Edinburgh.
Village was yet again the main attraction, The shows opened at 1000hrs and
as other Arms and Services are forever closed at 1500hrs daily. We weren’t told
only 750 kids daily, mainly due to envious at the ability of the Sappers to how many students to expect but each
trucker fuel protests in Scotland deny- sell their cap badge with the Trade day there were up to 1000. The majori-
ing school bus access to Edinburgh. Village. Visiting recruiting commanders ty of students would come over to you
The next stop was Catterick where reiterated this at every pre-show inspec- and all they wanted to know was where
an average of 7,500 kids visited the tion. Bassingbourn brought in some they could get dog-tags made. The fit-
ACE daily. The Trade Village was the 6,000 kids daily and more importantly ters tent was the busiest tent in the vil-
main attraction, in particular the diving the chance for Phase 1 Sappers to absorb lage; it seems that dog-tags were the
teams from 38 and 25 Engr Regts the capability of the Corps first hand with “must have” item for the students to
splashing unsuspecting kids from with- visits out-of-training. take back. On the other hand our toilet
in the diving tank…… a bit of pay- challenge wasn’t that busy and we had
back for enduring children’s unusual
LCpl Jones
to use all our hard selling techniques to
hand gestures, “grizzing” the lip-read- Our Fitter ACR course was due to get people to attempt it.
ing and being helpless to leave the finish in August and we were selected Next stop was Catterick. Whilst we
tank and redress bad-child behaviour! from a cast of thousands to be the peo- were setting up we were advised to put
During Catterick some 5,000 ple to represent our department at the our tent pegs in and guy ropes in with
“Camouflage Cards” were completed by Army Careers Exhibition. Lead by Sgt guy stakes. This was adhered to by
children. These cards identify children Colley, we had to create a Fitter ACR everyone except the draughtsmen. The
who have expressed a strong desire to and Plumbing display - something the next day in there were strong winds
receive Army Recruiting packs via the children could interact with and get and their tent was lifted and flipped
post for further information or indeed a some hands on - to go in the Engineers with all their hard workers inside.
visit to an ACIO. In Recruiting terms, Village. The Heating and Plumbing Overall it was funny to see the dif-
out of 5,000 children showing interest department came up with ‘The Toilet ferent groups of students. It has been
and as a “Recruiting Rule-of Thumb”, Challenge’ and ‘The Pipe Jigsaw’. The fun and I am looking forward to
this equates to some 350 or so individu- toilet challenge was two toilet systems Bassingbourn and Aldershot.
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