[the Photo fiasco]
by YBLalat

Yesterday morning, I got the two rolls of films that I sent to the U Bookstore to be processed and paid a handsome amount of USD$15.07 for the finished 60 pieces. It was worth it, I guess. This time around, I only had one screwed up picture of a fat guy in a soft blue parka walking in front of my lenses as I snapped a picture of a doorknob. That bastard! Other than that, all were good pictures and I had a wonderful time making up funny dialogues and giving out wacky titles for them. Most of the pictures were taken during the 2001 Midwest Games in Kalamazoo but there are other events also that I snapped a few more pictures. The Petronas US scholars’ annual meeting in Chicago and the day of my birth are to name a few events. I have a photo album full with photos taken from day one of my arrival here in the US until today, but I mailed home to Malaysia a lot of the original copies of the photos to my family and ask them to keep them. Most often, I would write stories about the photos at the back and they would have an enjoyable experience reading about me talking about the way the heater works and how melting snow feels in your hand. Then, my mom would mail me back pictures of my dad and my kid brothers so that I would still remember how they look like and match their names.

From the two rolls of films, there are several photos of my U colleagues and the event they took during the Games. It was such great fun to make up the dialogues and trying to reminiscent the moment the picture was snapped. Often, I would snap the photos during that rare moment of action, like your grimacing face when the served tennis ball hits your balls. I did not take any photos of my female colleagues in action during the Games because I spent a lot of the three-day on the soccer field and near the tennis court. Anyway, girls’ sports suck. Volleyball and badminton are for wimps. I prefer snapping action photos of a defender kicking the crap out of a forward’s knee in the name of goaltending. There was also men’s basketball event but I had to choose between staying for the soccer semifinals or witnessing the Malay basketball team getting beaten up by the Chinese team from hell. My decision made sense at the time but our soccer team lost the match anyway. They were beaten up like a band of small girl scouts.

One of the more peculiar sporting events that took place was an indoor soccer game for the ladies. I am pretty sure that the organizers held this event to draw legions of male spectators. How? Now, I want you to imagine the following. Young and hot girls my age in tight and thin sportswear running around and bumping into each other for a ball. The sweating and aggression and screaming and dirty talking surrounding the arena. You can’t be fat and short for this game, so imagine them slim and healthy and mature. Their long legs and small abdomen and firm ass used to magnificent result in order to kick the hell out of that ball into the back of the net. When they finally score a goal, they would celebrate by jumping and jumping and jumping and jumping and jumping. The male fans would also celebrate the girls’ goal with their wide open eyeballs going up and down and up and down and up and down in delight. Fortunately, I am a very pious person that I shun such sin of the eyes.

Then, there is the tug-of-war event that I was supposedly to be part of but in the last minute, the others taught that my body frame was too fragile. They added that since the weather was rainy and cool, the team might stand a better chance if they were to join forces with the stronger and more potential teams, meaning that all of the nerds need to be kicked out. Therefore, I was sadistically kicked out and as if there were no justice in this world, the team actually won 3rd place. Initially, they asked me to join their stupid entourage to the Games because there was just one more unfilled opening in the tug-of-war event. Being that I had nothing else to do before the summer classes start and I do think that I am somewhat brawny for the job, I said ‘Yeah’ to that offer. I paid up the joining fee for the Games and was so happy that I could contribute to my U’s sport team in whatever way that I possibly could. Now, I feel really fooled. In the end, I became just the geek photographer who hangs around with the cool jocks seeking an issue to talk with. The USD$15 that I paid gave me a registration card that needs to be hung from the neck for admission and it even spells my dad’s name wrong. What crap! That is the last time I am going.

Several other photos were on the new 20-years-old me and the US scholars’ 2001 meeting with our sponsor. There was nothing fun about the meeting because it was a corporate thing but I managed to meet a lot of my friends from PPP, especially my former roommates. They were still alive and kicking after all these years. I thought that maybe the ways of the States might have changed them into some strangers but no. They were cool the last time I saw them there in Chicago. I took some photos here and there and enjoyed my stay at the hotel like some business creep. It was really great to know how my sponsor is annually spending a lot of the nation’s oil and gas money to get scholars from the entire US to come and listen to the officials talk about the same thing from year to year. No wonder the Prime Minister likes this company so much. It is like a big fat piggy bank that never empties.

Last night, I uploaded all of the photos in my collection to a Yahoo site. It took me some time to categorize them into specific folders but all was worth the late night sleep and strained eyeballs. I tried to type in the fullest description about the photos and the venue it was snapped at but there was just too much. If you are really careful, you might find faces and names that are familiar to you but I do not guarantee that you will find your future spouse there. You might know now who are those that I keep stating on this journal and probably why I keep stating them again and again. There are my roommates, my kid brothers, and my U colleagues (Ed’s face is not there, thank God). Then, there are the strangers and the extras and the scenarios that make up the background of my life. And ultimately, there are the many faces of that guy that everybody wants to have, the face that keeps popping up inside your dream now and then to haunt you.

[Click here to ogle at the author's maladjusted face due to excessive nose-picking]