Team Demonz And The Melee In Kuala Lumpur

Fate brought me to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, well before the year of the Thaidalwave, back in the '90's actually. The pre-tsunami days were joyful, full of the kind of celebration of life, poverty, and any damned thing they felt like that makes the Malaysian people perhaps the friendliest and most accommodating people on the planet. If you ever find yourself south of Thailand, be sure to stop short of Singapore and spend at least a week in Malaysia.

Be prepared to party on only half your cylinders, though: Possession of any drug more fun than alcohol is punishable by death. Granted, using most drugs more fun than alcohol usually entails a flirtation with the Spectre, but Malaysian law links them inextricably. They also outlaw gambling and porn, but like everywhere on this carnival freak show of a planet, there's a well regulated black market to circumvent the law. The country is run by Muslims, and it seems that it's run very well: the trains are more or less on time, the streets are in more or less alright condition, and they aren't pointing nuclear missiles at anyone. Though alcohol is strictly forbidden in Islam, Malaysia allows it so as to keep the tourists happy.

It's a dandy of a country, and I was brought in to cover an ice hockey tournament at the Sunway Pyramid. Apparently the American and Canadian expatriate population has enough swing, and Ringitt, to have somehow wound up with an indoor ice hockey rink not but four degrees north of the Equator. The opportunity was ripe for a romp through another overlooked Asian country...and the doors started opening on the flight in.

Somewhere around 40,000 feet above the Atlantic Ocean, on our way to a layover in Stockholm, a tall Asian steward crept up the aisles with a beverage cart. Reaching my seat, his eyes grew wide at the sight of my hockey jersey. "You play hockey?" he asked, somewhat hastily. "Not really, I'm a writer," I said, and he asked energetically if I was on my way to the tournament in Kuala Lumpur. I said yes, and after his trip back down the aisle he sat next to me and asked all about hockey. We talked for three hours, when at length, he rose and shuffled off to rear of the plane. He came back as I was falling asleep, waking me by jamming something cold and round into my ribs.

I woke up. Fast.

"Take," he said, smiling through the dimly lit cabin on our midnight run over open water. "Take, take." I reached around and grabbed a bottle of French champagne. "You find my team," he continued, "team Demonz. You teach them American way to play, OK?"

Sure, I nodded. Why not?

He came back a few minutes later with another bottle, and explicit instructions to put one in each of my carry on bags, not to say anything at the border, and to look for him at the tournament. Then he disappeared into the black cavern of the 7something7, and I didn't see him for the rest of the flight.

Fast forward to Thursday night, a week later, with the tournament all wrapped up and the international teams ready to tear shit up in the tropics. In my hotel room I donned my cleanest dirty shirt, grabbed a strip of condoms with someone else's name and fake British contact information written on them with a fine-tip Sharpie, and headed for the door. Something called from the room, though, in the subtle, sexy way that sins can comfort you as they steal your soul.

I remembered the champagne.

Our bus was parked on the chaotic street, and was rocking oddly sideways, somewhat rhythmically, when I stepped out of the lobby with a bottle in each hand. The local tourist board was kind enough to provide us with free transportation to a player's party at a nightclub in KL (Club 72, if you're familiar...it's up the street from Beach Club, two blocks from the Towers). A team of Brits was already aboard, as I could tell by the accents flying out of the door and echoing off the teaming cars that fought for motion on an impossibly clogged street. The swaying bus threatened to tip and topple at any moment.

Climbing aboard, I saw the goalie locked in mortal combat with two defense players, one a huge Canadian, the other a New Zealand beast. They were thrashing about, destroying everything in their way...much to the delight of the crowd.

The glorious melee left two seats broken and various isolated destruction... pretty light damage, all things considered. I gave a bottle to the goalie and another to a friend, and they popped the corks with gusto. Champagne flew everywhere, and one bottle was emptied largely into the air as the goalie shook it and sprayed everyone within range. I somehow came into possession of a bottle of bourbon, which I took a long pull from while being soaked by champagne raining off the ceiling.

I lowered the bottle and looked out the window at a small crowd of Asian men who gathered on the sidewalk and were staring, mouths agape, through the tinted window at the madness and carnage and booze-showers inside. They pointed at us with their thumbs, the color draining completely from their faces. It was a curious sight, so I smiled and toasted them with the bourbon. They just blinked blankly up at me.

As it turns out, we trashed the bus they use to pick up Muslims to go to the Mosque on holy days. Whoops.

I had nothing to do with it, Allah. I swear.