there are alot of things that i haven't been doing for a long long time. maybe it's a change of lifestyle. but for many of them i believe it's good as it lets me spend less money. something which is of a rare commodity nowadays for me.
it all started in primary school. visiting the arcarde. well, in primary school. it was not that much of the main thing. my friends and i used to meet up in the weekends for movies, although not often, usually to celebrate somebody's birthday or to commemorate the end of the exams. there was not much primary school kids could do back then. shopping was certainly not hip for a group of guys 11 going on to 12 yrs old.lan gaming shops were not even in existence back then. so all we had were fast food chains, and there were only macs, kfc and the occasionally burger kings here and there..
so what could we do? movies. and we all know how we would not get the best timings for movies. it involves waiting an hour or two for the movie to begin. and there was no better way to waste that time away then in the arcade. daytona was all in the rage back then. mind you, not daytona 2, but the Original Daytona itself. so the few of us would throw our money into the machine and bang/crash the shit out of one another. you were not considered cool if you could not do the gear shifting drift at the last sharp corner of the novice track. another neat trick would be to drive into the pit stop and avoid stopping for pitting! some people used that as a short cut, but the number of times i tried it, i ended up coming out lagging behind the others. not that much of a short cut to me...
time crisis and virtual cop were two damn 'happening' games. knowing when and where the next foe would appear would make u the envy of others. aiming and shooting berserkly at the screen does not bring your cool-o-meter up another notch. acting cool was the name of the game. being able to use up all ur bullets and reloading (which requires you to shoot outside the screen for virtual cop, or step on the pedal for time crisis) fast was where you are able to level up ur cool-o-meter. you can also consider house of zombie in the same category as time crisis, but house of zombie requires alot of mindless gunpressing. it was way too tiring for my little fingers back then.
there were also other games like street fighter and king of fighters. but these were not as interactive as the rest i've mentioned. video games were really one of the best activities for guys. other then sports, going to each other's house to play video games was also a top favourite on my list back then. these doesn't really involve spending too much money, also sometimes we might get a very good treat from our friend's parents. hours will just fly by without us realising and the next thing we know, we'll all be calling our parents to pick us up wherever we are. yes, the good old days where you can just call home and a car will come arriving to pick you up.
so moving on to secondary school. suddenly we find that visiting the arcade was for little boys and that we're already too old for that. there was a bowling rage that actually went on for awhile in lower sec. and it was not cheap. each game was $2 for throwing the balls into the drain. and somehow, my friends loved to go to the one at pasir ris, which is now known as downtown east. imagine the time taken to travel each time. god knows wat i was thinking.
so what else can we do to waste our time while waiting for the irritating movie to start in one to two hours time? fret not, you can always go and play pool. suddenly everyone was playing it. and you have to be able to play it to be 'in' as well. and of cos now there are girls around as well. so you'll have to be good so as to impress them. pool wasn't exactly very cheap. i remember being charged $7 or more for an hour. and it was so fun that we all did not even bother to watch movie anymore. pool was where you can level you ur cool-o-meter now. i still remember a period of time where every weekend was spent at the pool parlour. each time even up to 4 to 5 hours. so hours and hours were put into it. and finally one day.. someone introduced something else. billiard. it was a much harder kind of pool. which included a bigger table, more rules, smaller balls, smaller holes, which eventually meant longer games. and the thing about billiard was that you could actually change the way you play it to actually gamble. so it meant more and more money.
as time passed, another rage was slowing forming. and it was to bring back the euphoria that i enjoyed as a kid. playing video games. now there's even a term for it. it's gaming. and online gaming shops are popping up everywhere to cash in on the Lan Gaming craze. Counter Strike battles were going on everywhere... from proper gaming shops and even to pool/billiard parlours joining in the fun as well as they had equipped computers in their shops for people to play Counter Strike. this came at a bad time for me and also my friends. this was at Sec 4 and O lvls prelims were just round the corner. the situation was not helped by the fact that half my class were playing Counter Strike and that we could easily organise trips down to the gaming shop just a few bus stops away from the school. but the Counter Strike sessions were the best that i've ever had. was pure fun. no other words to describe it. hours would zoom pass and studying seemed to be the last thing on my mind.
i fucked up my O lvl prelims... but the rest.. is history as they say.. visiting the arcade, pool or billiard parlours, being able to play Counter Strike are all rarity nowadays i can say. anyone up for it?
