An ol buddy (Bala, from the Night Train Incident) yesterday brought up a line from a cowboy movie dat we liked way back, Young Guns II. It goes sumtin like “You wanna see scars, I’ll show you scars.”
Reminded me of my share of scars n shit. Nothing major.
Lemme start from the top – scar on top of head (hit by a rock, courtesy of my cuz) (No known brain damage)
Damaged teeth, lower jaw (fell down a flight of stairs as a kid)
Right shoulder loose (rotator-cuff injury) (gym)
Bee sting on nuts (KKB. No permanent injury, but had interesting temporary side-effects!) Various leech bites too at same spot
Fractured + dislocated little finger (left) (football)
Fractured little finger (right) (basketball)
Fractured metacarpal, with one finger shortened by 5mm (BMW bike crash, KL)
Permanently-scarred left elbow (motorcycle crash, Langkawi)
Dislocated rib (my own superbike crash, KL). The rib still sticks out. Haha
Serious allergic reaction to bee-sting, Gunung Api (Pinnacles), Sarawak. (since then i’ve unfortunately become hyper-allergic to bee venom, and have to carry an adrenaline syringe when in d vicinity of forests)
Decompression in hyperbaric oxygen chamber at a Naval Base. Diving incident (no permanent damage)
Hepatitis from consuming contaminated food, Kandahar, Afghanistan. (Fortunately it was Hep A, meaning it comes for 2 weeks, then it’s gone for good. Unfortunately upon my return i cdnt drink for a month!)
Teeth mark scars (upper and lower jaw impressions) visible on back – bitten by human in Kota Baru)
Right knee ligament (ACL) torn (street soccer). I heard this one snap, like a large rubber band. Ouch.
That’s it for now, I think.
You know, i’ve done other seemingly riskier shit than above, like rock-climbing, white-water rafting, sky-diving, caving, protesting, bungee, mountain/river trekking, etc without any injuries at all. Well, no serious ones anyway. Strange.
There was once i contemplated the problems and pain injuries have caused me, and i envied geeks, coz they dont suffer from any injuries. At the most, their specs might scratch their forehead or sumtin. But d envy only lasted like, 1/10oth of a second. Doin shit regularly is fun. These lil injuries definitely aint gonna stop me from loving bikes, sports and d great outdoors. No pain no gain.
Life is short. Squeeze it.
i think most ouch musta been that ACL? I had my MCL snapped
Yea man, up there, with the motorcycle crash. One month medical leave. Nice
O God. How cd i forget this incident. When i was cruisin like a gangster in the back seat of my St John’s school bus, it fuckin hit a speed bump, while speeding. “Houston, we have lift-off” and i hit the roof, literally. And this was large bus with a HIGH roof. When i reached Earth, i landed on my goddam ass n hurt my lower spine. I cdnt play football for two years and was really bummed.
My spine still gets hurt occasionally at the gym. Bitch.