I missed Saturday's Star Metro!

Earlier this morning I received SMSes from Roger and Chuan that sounded a little bit like this:

Roger: Eh, our pictures are in the newspaper lol!

Chuan: We appeared in the newspaper already!

And I had no way of checking that article out as I was still on Pulau Tioman meditating and contemplating life.

I was serious!

I've just got back from a wonderful family holiday at Tioman, but now since I can't find a copy of the Star for sale, I got to wait till tomorrow find someone who has a copy. Oh well.

Thanks for all the encouraging comments that I have been getting over the past week. It really is heartwarming to know that people out there share my crazy sense of humour and that I am not alone in my quest to do crazy, crazy things.

Expect more to come from this space, and I'll post a scan of the article when I can. Cheers people!

Update:

Here are the pictures from Star Metro! But sadly they were far from flattering.

Seriously.

Oh well, but it's still the papers! (:

I'm a Standout in life!

In life, I make it a point to stand out in the things that I do, and I really mean it.


That's why I'm not going to write yet another crappy post about how I think I am awesome just because I can score good grades in school; because I can chow down a Wendy's burger and talk at the same time; or just because I dare to jump into the sea from a boat - that's just mundane routine for Kevin Chan here.

So I decided that to win this little Standout competition here, that I would have to do something really AWESOME for a change, something that would at the very least stand out strongly in my memory, and I am proud to tell you folks that I, collaborating with Roger (from the Republic of Awesome), Chia Wei (from chiawei.net) as our photographer and Tysern (from tysern.blogspot.com) as our bag-boy have managed to bring you the only ever...

SPARTAN INVASION OF ONE UTAMA (in recorded history)!

It all started with dinner with Roger in Singapore. We were both talking about Nuffnang's Standout competition, and it went on a little something like this:

Roger: Hey, we should join the competition lah, then we'll get to go to the party and all.

Kev: Yeah, but what are we to write about? We write about awesome stuff so much it all just doesn't feel awesome anymore.

Roger: Hmmm... maybe we should just go do something really awesome. Remember that time that I terrorized the hostel in a Spartan outfit, going this is SPARTA in poor Zac's face?

Kev: Yeah dude, you're on to something here, only that we have to do something a few levels more awesome than that... What if we... go around terrorizing random people in ONE UTAMA, in SPARTAN OUTFITS!

Roger: YEAH! Great, I'll get the red capes and I'll meet you at 3pm and we'll go off to One Utama together. How's that? Set?

Kev: Set lah!

And that was how we ended up in front of One Utama on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, all geared up to raid and terrorize our beloved shopping mall.

So how do you prepare to raid a shopping mall in Spartan gear? It all starts with the right gear.

Our Spartan shopping cart!

In the cart we have two really nice red towels capes, two nice wushu Spartan spears, some belts, a dustbin lid kickass golden shield and of course, a Spartan's favourite drink to relax after a hard day's work of killing and plundering - CHILLED TIGER BEER!

With all our gear assembled, we pushed our cart straight into the valley of the shadow of death, our own private Battle of Thermopylae, the gates of One Utama, getting one too many awkward stares on the way there. But those preliminary stares were nothing compared to what we were about to face on the inside of that wretched building.

We quickly found a toilet and went in as mere mortal men, but we emerged as IMMORTAL SPARTAN MEN, ready to rock ONE UTAMA!

One Utama, here we come!

And then it came from all around - the giggles and stares from the people around us. It took some getting used to, but a little giggle or a weird stare from an old wrinkled auntie never stopped Leonidas, and I guess it could not hurt us either.

Old auntie gives us the weird stare!

We go around with our gear and Tiger beer and attack all targets in sight!

There goes the Colonel!

We've got McDonalds in SPARTA now!

We were just posing with more beer when we realized that we were standing right in front of the great Spartan temple... the VIDEO SHOP!

The video shop, chock full with Spartan goodness!

And so, we raided the shop for what was rightfully ours!



We reclaimed what was ours, and we decided that we had to move on, and that there was more of One Utama for us to conquer.

Our heroes move on to their next battle!

The next logical step in our conquest of the shopping mall would be to attack the information counter. There definitely must be some intelligence we can obtain there!

We approached the information counter stealthily, but there was something there so awful, so terrible that it managed to hurt our hardened Spartan eyes - it was the evil QUEUE!

THIS IS MADNESS! THIS IS A MALAYSIAN QUEUE!

After what seemed like forever...


And that was when I just couldn't take the blasphemy that was happening right in front of me anymore.


I was so pumped up after kicking that blaspheming information-counter-guy into the deep, dark, bottomless-pit-of-death that I just went on a RAMPAGE!

It's ass kicking time!

Roger wants to stab the beer for some reason!

Take my animal rage, woman!

We even brought our madness all the way inside Toys-R-Us and the cinemas!

Toys-R-Us!


The Cinemas!


In short, no one could resist the Spartan invasion, and some people even stood on our side with us.

Okay, maybe just one...

But after we got our crowns from Burger King, things just started getting better and better!

Every king needs a fitting crown, and Burger King gave us theirs!

What's more awesome than Spartans invading One Utama?

Spartans chatting up chicks, of course!

Yup, we could do it wearing a red cape and holding a really long spear. Can you?

Energized by the power of our crowns, we went on running wild through One Utama!


We ended up having so much fun, that the some really obnoxious, old security woman that couldn't speak English tried to shoo us away, telling us that we need permission to take photos in One Utama! What utter rubbish!

She was real angry that we kept ignoring her complaints in Malay (I admit, that I am a bit rusty here) but we were never one to pass a good photo op by, and so here is a goofy picture with an absolutely furious, bitchy old security hag.

Just look at that super DULAN look on her face! Priceless!

The mall security elsewhere were more friendly and even offered to pose with us!

The friendlier mall cops.

It was a long day, even for us Spartans, and we finally decided to call it a day at the bowling alley in One Utama's new wing.(But not without some more cam-whoring, of course!)

Some bowlers even wanted pictures with us!

A great shot with our excellent photographer, Chia Wei!

Considering that we started right all the way back in the center court of the old wing, made a whole big and walked all the way to the bowling alley of the new wing, I can safely say that we Spartans did indeed manage to conquer most of One Utama!

And finally, after a hard Spartan day's work of terrorizing, plundering, rampaging, pillaging, and conquering, it was time for a nice cold Tiger.

Just what a spartan needs after a hard day's work.

And my little Spartan invasion here is just why I stand out so much more than the 99.999% of bloggers out there. Period.


To you guys at Nuffnang, Robb, Timothy, Ming, I really want to go to this party, so I have my tickets, pretty please? At least enough tickets so that all four of my friends who helped me out in this AWESOME AWESOME blog post can all be there and make your event an even better one.

And also, I promise to try not to get drunk this time. Serious!

Hope to see you at the party!

***

Just for you guys, the posts of the other guys who were part of the Spartan Invasion!
Roger
Chiawei

Exercise Your Right

As a former civics teacher, I have to say this: if you are eligible to vote, please do so in the coming general election.

Election is coming. Elect, don't just erect!

It is heartening indeed to go into school and see how excited my students are about the upcoming election, but it really is heartbreaking to hear that there are so many eligible voters out there who just don't care.

Don't you care about how your country is run? Have you never ever felt dissatisfaction over the way things are run? If you are perfectly content with the current state of affairs, then it is perfectly understandable that you remain politically neutral.

But the thing that irks me is that there are people who complain about the injustices committed by our government, but when the time comes for them to exercise their right to choose, they choose to abstain instead.

Just go vote la, arrgh!

I love and truly believe in my country, Malaysia. We have the best food in the region, we're blessed with so many historical and natural wonders, our lands are rich with natural resources, but corrupt politicians and general mismanagement have made our blessed nation far less than perfect.

If we don't do something - Samy, the eternal transport minister.

As Malaysians, it is our responsiblilty to both the people who have come before us, and to the generations after us, to vote for the party that can bring our country to greater heights. So, don't waste that vote of yours, lest it ends up voting for a darker future, without you even knowing about it.

Am I the only one who finds it weird (and irritating) that Barisan Nasional ads are EVERYWHERE, from the newspapers to the radios to even my MSN INBOX! YES, MY MSN INBOX IS NOT SPARED!

That adspace must have cost A LOT!

Where does Barisan get all this money to fund all these advertisements? Out of the taxpayers coffers? Guess we'll never know unless we make our voice heard.

Perhaps we need to do it like this?

Go and VOTEEEEEEEEEE la!

Perhaps he's exactly what we need.