The following article was published in The Star on August 29, 2010.  One boy mans up when he confronts his own thirst and hunger during Ramadhan. AS a 10-year-old, nothing gave me more joy than not being treated as a 10-year-old. It was a time when I wanted to do everything I couldn’t. Drive a car, go out on my own, work, earn money, buy stuff, snore, curse ... I practically wanted to do everything adults were doing. Except pay taxes. And fast. I feared fasting. I couldn’t imagine playing the routine round of catch during recess and not chugging away my 1.5-litre tumbler afterwards. I may have been the school’s catch champion but, without water, I was only as fast as Kuala Lumpur traffic at 6pm. I began fasting a bit later in life compared to my peers. Some started as early as seven. When Ramadhan came, as my friends diligently observed the holy month, I diligently observed them coping with hunger and thirst instead. Meanwhile, at the canteen, I’d shamelessly wolf down a plate of mee goreng. I had tried fasting earlier. But my initial attempts either lasted no more than three hours, or didn’t actually count. I would “accidentally” drink, or, as a last resort, beg for my parents’ mercy to end my starvation. Realising my frustration with my own vices, I was often consoled by my mother, who told me that I would still be rewarded with pahala (spiritual merits) for my effort. However, as the Ramadhan of 1993 approached, I made a resolution to fast properly for a whole day. No more “half-day” fasting. No more accidentally breaking my fast. And more importantly, no more recess with the small kids. It was time for me to man up, and be one of the big boys. Which is why I chose a Saturday to fast for the first time. We didn’t have to be in school. The challenge began as early as 5am. As I was (again) playing catch with the Care Bears on a rainbow in dreamland, I was awakened by my mother’s voice to get up for sahur. But waking me up at five is no different from waking me up at eight. You’d need to rev a Harley near my ears before I could open my eyes. And as she didn’t have a Harley, I had to be dragged to the dining table. It was a battle between the mind and the heart. While my favourite dishes had been prepared for me to prepare for the big day, I had the appetite of a runway supermodel. I did realise that I had to fill myself up to face the next 12 hours. But even after washing my face, I still could barely munch anything. After a bite of bread and a gulp of water, I was on my way back to my beloved bed to continue running with the Care Bears. Waking up at 8am, I headed straight to the living room to catch my weekly dose of Saturday morning cartoons. “This should be a breeze,” I thought. The usual sequence of cartoons would run until noon and I wouldn’t even notice the time. Or so I thought. By the end of Goof Troop and the beginning of DuckTales, my stomach was grumbling as I recalled the bowl of cereal that would usually sustain me through noon. Images of golden frosted flakes swimming in a pool of milk began to appear in my head. But the young warrior in me didn’t budge. As I held tightly to the sofa and kept my eyes straight on the TV – switching it off whenever the junk food commercials came on – I managed to reach the end of TaleSpin as the clock struck noon. Half the battle, won. I had expected the rest of the day to be tougher. The temperature was rising and I could feel the scorching heat even under the ceiling fan, which was on full blast. There I was in the middle of the living room staring at the clock whose hands seemed to defy gravity. Time was moving slower than ever. I felt powerless. “Five more hours,” said mum, as she witnessed her son’s misery. “Five more wha--?” I said. The sound of running water in the kitchen alerted me to the majestic beauty of its flow. And its ability to quench my thirst. A part of me wanted to just run and drown myself in a full tub of water and drink it all. But I barely had the energy to lift the TV remote, let alone crawl away. “Two more hours,” I heard as I blinked and took a glance at the clock. I’d slept. But was too tired to dream of anything. The rest gave me some willpower to carry myself to the dining table, where I sat with my head lying flat on its surface. The aroma of the dishes mum was preparing crept into the hall and one plate after another made its way to the table. I could only look and hope that the clock would miraculously go to 7.28pm suddenly. Or that somebody would mistakenly recite the maghrib prayers earlier than he was supposed to. Neither happened. As the clock finally ticked down to maghrib, my hand was holding tightly on to a huge jug of ice cold air tebu. Nothing would ever come between me and my first drop of liquid for the day. Not even the never-ending stream of commercials on TV leading to maghrib. As the sound of the azan filled the air, I had probably the longest chug of water ever. I could feel the air tebu branching out into my veins, turning my blood green. It was one of the most satisfying drinks of my life. A treasured memory I could barely describe in words. One that taught me the wonders of Ramadhan and its reward for those who fast. After our meal, I reflected on the day and, surprisingly, found myself looking forward to my second day of fasting. But that didn’t happen until the following year.
 A good friend had just returned to poetry writing. And in the early pages of her notebook, she wrote the following. Words could barely express our gratitude. Thank you Lia. You rule. Yaya and Asrif, When I think of you, these pop into mind. Polaroid Cameras Sunshine and Moonlight. Satire and Giggles. Roti Durian. Man vs. Food Malaysian Edition. Vintage Dresses. Footprints across a sandy beach. Dusk and Dawn. KL Traffic Tweets. Baju Kurung and slippers. Poems and Postcards. Dancing on a stage to a Latin Beat. Photowalks. Surprise Birthday Parties. Finding joy in the simple things in life. Family and Friends. Laughter. Happiness. But Most of all, I see Love and two halves of a whole when I think of you two. Celebrate your lives together. Make it full of happy memories, Laughter, Love, mess, food, creativity and people who love you. This will carry you through life’s little bumps on the road And together, love will see you through. By: Angelia Ong 04 August 2010.
 Hollywood have tried so hard. Talking robots from outer space, vampire-human-werewolf love triangle, Sarah Jessica Parker. All they ever needed was a movie with Leonardo DiCaprio, the guy from 500 Days of Summer, Ken Watanabe and Juno in the same team. I’m bad at reviewing movies. Let’s just say Michael Bay is the Justin Bieber of the film industry, and Chris Nolan is Pink Floyd.
 You know how songs take you back in time to a certain place and paint the picture of a past event. A picture so vivid you could almost feel the atmosphere of that occasion. Happens to me all the time. I bet you recall the time you turned a badminton racket and ping pong ball into a makeshift ice hockey stick and puck whenever you hear Queen's "We Are the Champions" -- from The Mighty Ducks. Okay, that was me. Maybe you remember lying on your bed holding a copy of Smash Hits with Lance Bass on the cover in a room filled with posters of Peter Andre whenever you hear "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys. Okay, that was me as well. You get the picture. Music is a time machine. It creates a continuum where you're free to pick a point in the timeline and go there just by exposing your aural sense to a melody, or even a sound. It's true. Even a sound. For every time I hear a gong bell ringing, I'm brought back to a fateful Wednesday evening in 1996. WWF "Raw is War" was on TV. And just as any 13-year-old at the time, I was watching it, with my younger brother. The main event was The Undertaker vs. Kane, whose guts I hated more than the dentist because he thrashed Shawn Michaels, my favorite wrestler of all time, the week before. So I rooted for The Undertaker, who walked into the ring to the sound of -- yes -- a gong. The epic battle saw blood, sweat and tears smeared all over the ring as the two gentlemen grappled their way to the cheer of a jam-packed arena, most of whom still firmly believed that professional wrestling is real. It was pandemonium in the squared circle. But it wasn't until the dying minutes of the clash that saw The Undertaker turning Kane upside down and delivered his signature Tombstone Piledriver knocking him out to snatch a victory. In the heat of the moment, and excited of the euphoria of it all, I turned my brother upside down and did the same to him, but on the sofa instead of the floor (as a safety measure). Little that I knew, there was a plank underneath the sofa. So let's just say he felt the impact just as Kane did on TV, if not worse. He screamed of pain and rolled on the floor as I panicked in fear of the consequences that I might endure. It was one of the scariest moments in my life. I may be banned from watching professional wrestling forever. But that's my story. What's yours?
 According to the guys who invented it, "Twitter is a real-time information network powered by people all around the world that lets you share and discover what's happening now." The key words here are "share" and "discover". Twitter allows you to broadcast your thoughts and learn about others'. "Thoughts", in this context, refers to ideas, emotions and feelings. It constitutes everything that the human mind could possibly think of. Including "My crotch is itchy." I posted my first tweet on a lonely April 29, 2009 evening and it read, "How does this thing work?" The question remains unanswered. In fact, the system has become so convoluted that I had to take a step back, and assess the situation. The situation As of Tuesday, July 13, 2010, I've tweeted 2,648 times to 102 followers, while following 75. I've tweeted about music, sports, love, food, love, travels, love, movies, and love. Those who follow me would attest. And I've broken all the rules of tweeting. Everyone has. Simply because there aren't any. Twitter is freedom of speech with only one constraint: 140 characters. (Ignore the cretins at TwitLonger.) After a year on Twitter, I've come across presumably all the different styles of tweeting in existence. I can never possibly list down all of them here. But let's just say it ranges from "@MrSeriousPerson: The growth of world's third largest economy slowed down in the second quarter. " to "@fluffywabbit: my new handbag is so pwettyyy jyeah LOL!!!1" to "@itweeteverything: Ha... choom..." In other words, I've exposed and engrossed myself in too many things I don't have to know. No matter how pwetyyy the handbag was. I became preoccupied with checking on Twitter updates. Picking up my BlackBerry and scrolling through UberTwitter turned into a norm. A habit I knowingly do while realizing that it adds very little value to my life. I see no reason for me to know what my friend had for lunch. Yet, I still read about it. Before I tell the world what I had for lunch as well. Admittedly, a part of me is receptive to the sensationalism that Twitter brings. It's like watching reality TV, in texts, updated live, in real time. These buzzwords portray the extent to which the world has become smaller and smaller. And how the life stories of others are just at the flick of my finger. Thing is, I've always been a person who rather not know when it comes to the dramas in the lives of others. I prefer watching those in movies, where it's fictional. The world is rough enough as it is already. But that was before I was pulled into reading tweets. A stream of which, is a tsunami of emotions and whether it's good or bad, positive or negative, happiness or sadness, it's contagious.  Society's typical reaction to profane tweetsThe assessment Twitter users in general do get overwhelmed, more often than not. And the common remedy has been, expectedly, taking a break. Ignore Twitter. Don't check for updates for a day or two. Hide that Twitter application on your phone. Cold turkey or not, people find breathing space in this -- with some withdrawal syndrome, to a certain degree. I got overwhelmed by Twitter recently. The sentiment of not having to know what I unintentionally knew, grew stronger. I was fed with too much information, too much details, too much 140-character anecdotes and too much happenings. Most of which, I could live without. But that's just me on the receiving end. Being where, I was assimilated into the trend of projecting my thoughts incessantly as well. Telling the world things I don't really have to. Simply because I learned, from other users, that there's nothing wrong with it. Twitter became the platform for people to let out to people who may or may not care. And I was one of them. Pot calling kettle. At the same time, I still believed that Twitter is a powerful tool, if utilized to its optimal best. I believe that Twitter brings out creativity in people. It creates a culture of being concise, and a community that appreciates information that are delivered directly without beating around the bush. Twitter is capable of making things more efficient. It saves time. To find a balance between these two extremes, I conducted a little experiment to see how I'd adapt to change. While taking a break may be a short-cut way to see how I would react, I opted to do the reverse, and spent more time on Twitter. The little experiment Using my own account, I unfollowed half of the people I've been following, and replaced them with BBC News. So at one point, my Twitter consisted of individual accounts of people tweeting about their lives, and BBC News, who tweets on average 3 to 5 headlines from around the world every 10 minutes. The hypothesis was that I'd reach a thoroughly balanced stream of tweets blending stories of the people I know, and the happenings around the world -- the ideal Twitter. A healthy blend of useful and useless information. Yes, useless information can be useful, given the right amount. The result The setting ran for 32 hours. Every now and then, I'd check to see the pattern of tweets I subscribed to. Following are some observations:
 Fig. 1.1 - Importance of tweetsIn a nutshell Shortly after feeling I've studied enough, I duly unfollowed BBC News, and went back to following the people I unfollowed for this, academic purpose. I've come to the conclusion that the stage I was at, prior to conducting this research was already the optimum usage of Twitter. Filtering what to read or not is to be done manually. It's all about coordinating the eyes to send a signal to the brain and tell it that a tweet is not worth reading by the third word. There's no way for one to reach the ultimate balance in filtering the content he follows on Twitter. If I ever needed to read the news I want, there's always this old thing called websites. Twitter is for me to know about your lunch. Note: While I could've just skipped this trivial study and used the "List" function on Twitter, let it be known that I just needed something to update this blog. Cheers.
The following article was published in The Star on June 27, 2009.  With my old man at the City of Manchester Stadium Clearance Store, where we won't be shopping had the owners bestowed their wealth to the supporters as wellBefore the money started flooding in, it was a football club on a rollercoaster ride with only one thing to boast – loyal fan support. WHEN my boys were growing up, I taught them the truth. That there are only two teams in Manchester, England: Manchester City and the Manchester City reserves,” my father used to say. And that’s the truth I believe in. You see, I’m a Manchester City fan. No I didn’t omit “United”. I’m a supporter of Manchester City Football Club. The Citizens. The Blues. City. Or, in the words of one Sir Alex Ferguson, “the noisy neighbour” – probably because his team isn’t located in Manchester. I’ve been a City fan all my life. And by “all my life”, I don’t mean since September 2008, when a takeover made it the richest club in the world. I was a City fan when we were playing Colchester in the third tier of English football. Those were the dark days when the only football action I got was scurrying for its result in the Sunday morning newspaper. The fixation began from a fascination. As a child, I often wondered about my father’s fluctuating emotions when watching football. From shouting at the top of his lungs to grumbling words I couldn’t write down here, to the deafening silence when he switched off the TV in the middle of a match. At that age, I couldn’t grasp the concept of cheering for 11 men who couldn’t hear a word even if you went berserk in front of the TV. At most, it would give the neighbours a headache. But seeing him so affected by the game was an eye-opening experience. There’s got to be something about it that made my then 40-year-old father dance like Billy Elliot. From an observer, I slowly braved myself to start watching football together with him. While his sudden roars often put me at risk of premature heart attack, I began to understand the mechanism of the game. I began to feel a connection with the team. I began to know the names of the players. I began to capture the drama, the mesmerising movements of the players, the difference a split-second decision makes, and, above all, the electrifying joy whenever the ball hits the back of the net. And before I knew it, I was jumping and screaming like a madman alongside my dear father whenever City scored. I was officially a City fan. Which also meant I had a hard time in school. Of course, the other kids were supporters of either Manchester United or Liverpool. (Chelsea was yet a Russian billionaire’s fantasy football team at the time.) So following a team whose achievement was no more than winning the Second Division play-off proved to be difficult. I still remember a discussion about “the greatest player in the world” among my friends. As they threw in names like Cantona, Giggs, Rush and Fowler, I howled Kinkladze, a City cult hero. A momentary silence followed, before they burst into laughter that shook the classroom. A day in the life of a schoolboy City fan. City is known to often stumble at the brink of success. Lady Luck was rarely on our side, which has earned us too many “typical City”’ moments, among which was conceding a goal after the goalkeeper got confused when a balloon came in from the stands. Not to mention that City is the only team in history to ever be relegated in the season – after winning the League. It could only happen to City. Suffice to say, we’ve slipped on too many banana skins. And I shall end this painful paragraph here. But therein lies the beauty of supporting this incredible football club. Following City teaches me a lot about life. Watching a 90-minute City match reminds me that life is full of uncertainties and twists of fate. That there is always a silver lining. That you must be honest to yourself. That you have to remain optimistic – even if it means waking up at 3am only to see the players battered by a lower division team. Through the years, City fans have gained a reputation for being some of the most loyal supporters in England. Their stadium attendance remains one of the highest, considering the club’s success, or lack of it. And that has fostered generations of passionate fans who have never lost the faith. Here in Malaysia, the number of City fans is growing. But that wasn’t the case until the recent acquisition brought us a fortune. My first meeting with the small group of City fans is still fresh in my mind. A group of gentlemen 10 to 20 years my senior who are never short of stories about their City misfortunes. All told with great humour. It was a time when City supporters were so rare that we’d approach any stranger wearing a City kit on the street. Our gatherings were small yet colourful. It was always a family affair. The guys would bring their kids and, occasionally, their wives. And in the confused eyes of the children, I saw a glimpse of my bewildered self looking at my overjoyed father more than a decade ago. This football club has done wonders in bringing families together. Perhaps, someday, it would be my turn to scare my kids when I jump up and down watching a City game. Someday, it would be my turn to tell my children the truth. I hope they can handle the truth. |
 Photography by Azalia Suhaimi
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