... notable events : Organising the 1987-88 Party Years

As highschool seniors, the world was our oyster.

But best of all, it was also the time when we discovered that greatest of discoveries. We found out that girls were not only fun to be around, they were also interested in dorky boys like us too. (although none of us would have admitted to being dorky but instead, would have objected rather violently to the contrary since all of us were just so handsome, dashing and oh so to-die-for-drop-dead-gorgeous to the opposite sex!)

We were a group of scouts from the 5th Petaling Scout group of an all boy's secondary school, and one of our greatest achievement claims to date was to have linked up with a group of Girl Guides of the 1st Kuala Lumpur Coy of the Methodist Girl's School (MGS), KL. It was heaven on earth so far as we were concerned and every weekend was a party.

I was to make official contact and to invite the Coy for a gathering together with our Troop for our first joint gathering. For days I could hardly think of anything else. I procastinated and waited, gathering my wits about me until I could not put it off anymore. "So have you arranged it yet?" my friends and scouting seniors would ask, grins on their faces, cowards all. So one evening after school I puffed up my chest, gulped in deep breaths and stilled my beating heart.

I sat on the mid-level staircase landing where the home telephone was and recited in my head the things I would ask and the things I would say. I ran through the whole senario in my head and tried to anticipate the things I would say to this girl. Then I dialed.
"Hellothisiskitmengcallingonbehalfofthe5thPJtroopandIam..." gasp, breath, "...supposedtoarrangeajointgatheringtogetherwithyourcoy..." and off I went.

It was hilarious on hindsight but the terror quaking in my voice was real that day. The girl I spoke to was the Coy leader and as all females her age were, she was cool as a cucumber. "I was expecting you to call me earlier." she said crossly.

Oops.

But it all went well from that day on. She became one of my good friends and quite a few of us nerdy guys hooked up with that bunch of cool MGS girls over the course of the year. We started arranging parties and dances. Held at our houses, we rotated the location every week. A group of us got so good at arranging parties that they started offering their services to other equally "happening" highschool groups. Living rooms were transformed into the hottest discos in town, dining rooms became loveseating, garden verandas turned into places of whispered sweet nothings in the moonlight. Strob-lights were purchased, mixers, speakers, flashing neon lights, backlights, and neighbours were annoyed with the latest hit songs on cassette tapes which belted out the vocals of the likes of Whitney Houston, Stevey Wonder and the likes of which have never returned to the airwaves except in oldies channels.

I wasn't part of that entreprenising group as we were extremely clickish at the time, but I enjoyed myself all the same, tagging along to party, turning up at parties with my shirt trendily untucked, hair combed slick but still somehow managing to look ganggly and dorky all the same despite my best efforts. It was the teenage years and looking great for the girls was our number one priority as well as our number one failure. But is was a time when we had fun. It was a time to try out all our great moves only to have them fail and fall flat on our faces in the face of an actual female. It was the time when we would try breakdancing and end up looking more like amatuerish yoga.

Some of us made better headway with the girls than others, pairing off to disappear into the darker corners of the dance floors. Others like me could only watch in despair as our self-esteems took yet another beating to see the pretty girls disappear in arms not of your own. But party we did, and made friends with girls we also did, discovering the beauty and softness of the female anatomy as we went. The beat was hypnotic, and we all danced like it was the most important thing to grace our young lives. We practiced it at home, we hummed the songs in class, we applied ourselves with a vengeance at the next party. The norm was for fast dances then slow dances nearing the later parts of the night. Since one of us was always in control of the music and DJed the party, we ALWAYS made sure we had slow dances. That part was for most of us, the best part of the party and every girl was fair game.

The honeymoon years was what it was called, the years before our final SPM or "GCE O-level equivalent" exams. We were young punks and brats who left houses the morning after in a mess, furniture in disarray, food stains on the carpets, used untensils and plates littering the place, and the floor much too sticky from too much soda, smuggled booze and other unmentionable sticky stuff. We were only young once we would chorus to our naysayers. And we were cool. I think those guys who sold their services in setting up parties made some money although till this day they still refuse to say, but as far as I was concerned, we had fun. We were quite literally, Party Central and where we went, so went the party.

Life was good.