i was on cable tv on friday evening! hahaha.

i think this is going to be one of the longest personal entries in a while. so treasure it till the next one. haha haven't blogged in so so so so long so i'll take a brief respite from the dreariness of agricultural geog and integration to type a little about my life.

friday was a curious experience! pretty cool one though. after the blah gp paper in the morning (As have started! ack.) i went to the ESPN starsports headquarters in lorong chuan to film an episode of football crazy with the bayern munich fan club. got adeline along HAHAHA and she said i never let on that it was a live tv filming session (apparently this is what i told her: adeline: ok, so it all began with my darling feng. she told me that there was an "exhibition" at espn hq in conjunction with the bayern munich fan club, and "jamie reeves was going to be there" and she asked me if i wanted to go. and since the hq's just 5 min walk from my house (tres cool eh!) i just decided to go.) well i can't partly remember whether i told her it was a studio session, but i vaguely remember being rather prone to circumlocution when she pressed me earlier on what it was for.

yes so anyway we headed to the ESPN hq where we had to sign some funny waiver so that our "names, appearances and likenesses" could be used for regional broadcasts on the channel. Imagine! my likeness on every television screen! hahaha. there was this lady called sharkey (what a name!) who briefed us on what to anticipate and we had to rehearse all the banter and questions and answers pre-show, which i thought was pretty contrived. But still. Anyway i was supposed to respond to a pre-sent SMS that went something along the lines of: "i think the reason why oliver kahn is such a good goalkeeper is because he looks so scary. With his scary face, strikers don't even dare to score!" well. when i first heard the statement i kinda thought the sender was of decidedly limited mental acuity, but yeah since oliver kahn is one of my favorite topics, i came up with a stupid two-liner about how his form had indeed deteriorated after WC2002 but i'd no doubt that he'd be back to his bulldog best in time to come. And adeline was supposed to add that she thought he looked scary anyway. there was still time before we went on air so we busied ourselves with free drinks from the dispensing machines and playing a rather unexciting game of table soccer (may i add, with a wadded-up kitchen towel procured from the pantry since there wasn't no ball in sight) which ended in a 1-1 draw courtesy of a last gasp goal from me.

then it was time to hit the airwaves of the region! i'd originally intended to hide at the back but sharkey made me sit in front (which wasn't that bad in itself, just that everytime the camera panned into view of the two hosts i appeared in full glory on the television screen since i was sitting next to them). there were 2 guests besides the hosts andy and collette, this aussie hunk called PJ roberts (man he's damn hot la. serious.) and our very own homegrown sheikh haikel, whom adeline later admitted she'd been dying to ask "did you really do drugs?" but she didn't in the end. darn.

anyway sheikh haikel, in testimony to his girth, kept eating throughout the show. and his impression of czech beauties he came across while hosting a modelling show was hilarious. the way they'd dissolve into giggles and swoons everytime he mentioned the name "milan baros", since that was the only thing remotely czech he could say to them. haha he's just damn funny la. even if he did do drugs. it was a blast being on air- even though we had to wear awful little party hats that made me look positively weirder than usual, and we had to cheer and sing some funny bayern jingles which i thought were rather corny. and everytime the camera would pan to the hosts i'd try to lean to one side to get out of its range, but the first few times i misjudged and leaned towards collette instead, and i'd realise and hurriedly jerk back out of sight. i think that happened several times, not very glamorous really. hahaha.

oh and then i got my 20seconds of individualised fame! after they showed a clip of oliver kahn in all his snarling glory and read out that sms. so i duly reprised the two lines above, after which the camera zoomed out again, which was a good thing because i thought i looked awfully pasty on screen. argh. pity bayern lost the night before to juve (cursed be you, del piero!) if not there might've been more things to say. football crazy also showed snippets from the '99/'00/'01 champions league (manchester united heartbreak and valencia joy) and then showed an earlier video the hosts dressed up in bavarian costume and displaying emotions in relation to bayern's fortunes. they did a funny bavarian jig which was pretty hilarious too haha.

anyway it was a very interesting experience indeed! being on tv, talking about my favorite topic in the world, albeit in stupid party hats and looking pasty. excellent way to destress from the horrors of the As. anyway back i go to work!