See this girl?
The first year we met and became firm friends was in 1993, in Crescent Girls' School Sec 1/9, the supposedly Good-In-English class, under the strict tutelage of Madam Sharifah Aljunied.
That very same year, due to some freak reflex action during a batu selembat game gone wrong, I accidentally shoved my index finger up her nose. Betol. Tak bedek. When I got that wretched finger out, the nail had little bits of green gooey stuff under it. Needless to say, I was traumatized. So was she.
We still remained friends.
The second year in Sec 2/9, the same class under the same Madam Aljunied, we played catching (yes...dah 14 tahun pon main kejar-kejar) and though it was not my turn to be pursued, that girl you see above chased me anyway because when I caught her during my turn, I lifted up her skirt and exposed her underthings to the world. So in the heat of avenging her outraged modesty, with the help of Mardi and Nithya, she chased and caught me but I tried to wriggle out of their grasp, valiantly protecting my underthings from being exposed. In our hilarious struggle, all of us tumbled to the floor in a pile, that girl you see above pinned under the mass of bodies. Still giggling helplessly, that girl you see above put her hand to head and felt something wet and sticky. She took a look at her hand and that wet and sticky thing was blood. Her blood. Lots of it. She cut her head when she fell down but she didn't feel a thing. The ambulance came. Even the police came. More blood and three stitches later, our catching game was over. Needless to say, I was traumatized. So was she. And Mardi. And Nithya.
We still remained friends.
The third year in Sec 3/3, the Niners were all shuffled around but the girl you see above became my classmate again. Under the bochup tutelage of Mrs Lim Scandal-Black-Bra, we were the Good-In-Merepekness class. We did our own thang (she had her own stuff and I had my hockey and my boypren from that particular boys' school....yikes!) but we still stayed as close as ever with so much nonsense up our lemon-yellow sleeves. We did drift apart a tiny little bit as compared to the closeness we had before but we would skip classes together, hide from Cikgu Samat to avoid our morning runs together and failed Maths together (we would rig the overhead projector before Maths class so that the Maths teacher would fiddle with it a bit, assume it's rosak and borrow from the next class and that little OHP drama would eat nicely into our Maths period for the day!).
We still remained friends.
And then Sec 4/3 commenced and we embarked on our final Crescentian year with Mr Bradley Jones as Mrs Lim Scandal-Coli-Hitam gave up on us. Nakal sangat, nie budak-budak pompuan Crescent! We had our own cliques and we had our own fun but we still had each other. I'd still cry on her shoulder when the guy I was crushing hard on crashed out on me. She'd still make me laugh and she'd still feed me with her mother's famous Spaghetti and Meatballs. We'd still skip classes and everything else together. And we continued playing catch, still with exposed panties but sans bloody heads and stitches.
We still remained friends.
And now, more than a decade since we first became friends, I'm happy to note that we only get closer as we get older. We hold on to this friendship fiercely. We triumph over time and its effect on other friends by holding firmly to our loyalty and respect for each other. Even as we went on so many different paths, our smoke signal's always the same, our cries just as frantic yet our laughters just as mirthful. She'd be there. And I'd be there. Though I'd like to state for the record that she tries harder at it than I do coz I'm always so bloody far away!
And I know in my heart, as we move on to to more decades together, we'd still remain friends. Maybe one day all of us can get together and play catching. Heh.
So Nazreen (that girl you see above), thanks for all the happy happy happy memories.
In this life where each year that comes would definately bring me one person from the flock I'd love to boot out of the game, you're one person I'd never vote off the island coz you're worth more than a million bucks, my friend.
Happy 25th Birthday!
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