Old Friends & Reunions

Got a pleasant surprise when was contacted, via facebook, by old school mates. Am talking primary school mates from way back when i was considered short (height that is..)

Gerik, Perak was a communist occupied little town which so happened to be nearby the Temenggor Dam which was where LLN (TNB now) was deriving its power from. Dad was with LLN so the family moved from Prai to this outskirts as he was posted there. The town was under constant curfews as the Commies were aparently still holding fort in the jungles of Perak then. Started my Standard 2 and was there till Standard 6.

School was where u had ur most friends and friendships formed during primary school days are rather special and diferent from those at other phases of your life. I suppose its the formative years where you still believe in magic and ur innocence is still intact.

I remember our class clown Rostam who'd bring the house down with his antics and impersonations..Hew Fong Pin who introduced me to the Beatles, Ugarajah who was with me the tallest in the class, Vallarmathi the Chinese gal raised by Indian family, Faridah who was the school tomboy, Raymond who was the best badminton player, Judy, the city gal who came and showed us city attitude and was always getting number one, Laila the thoughtful one, Esther who thought the boys there was more to life then football and guli playing.
Amazing how tis the gals who take the trouble to track us down one by one. Guys cant be bothered at all.

Then we had the college reunion with the now lawyers all gathering and talking about the happenings in Perak and the current judicial system. Was glad to meet up the old gang but got quickly bored when they started throwing legal terms left and right as the alcohol got flowing( making me silently thankful i didnt take that path).

Would say the best reunion would be when old friends gather not so much to see where ur working now and which surburbs u're living in but just plain ole catching up on good times. U'd like to believe they havent changed a bit and hoping that same old person you knew as the snotty nosed clown or the thoughful and serious 9 year old would come out and transport you back to the days when race, status and how much u'r parents earned didnt matter.

Seems to me everyone is trying impress each other with what they have achieved since we last goofed around as kids.

Thankfully there are those who still long for the magic we all shared then and still bring up embarrasing and laugh ur ass off moments of yesteryear (though a few of them outright denied it ....as if those years never happened).

But those years DID happen. Im glad i can see these captains of industries not for where they are now (which im glad for), but for what they were then..kids i used to live, learn and fight with. I treasure David, who was the one everyone went to for advise and made all feel speacial, Sharon who tutored me at the cafeteria after college, Ben who possesed a calm, quite and gentle soul, the late Ler Weng Siang whose nerdiness we tried to change but we loved him anyways, Prem my best friend and starving partner during the lean years, Stephen who called a spade a spade, even to a shovel.Judy who made me go from number 21 to number one..Azlan who knows what friendship truly means, Zakaria whom i had my frst beer with..

Would i have gotten better education/social ranking if i hadnt moved around too many times all those years? Perhaps, perhaps not...but i know this for sure, wouldnt change a single thing if i had to do it all over again if it meant not meeting these friends.