Ah Mah and Wrestling
Greetings, to my thousands of non-existent readers,
it’s been a while since I stepped foot into this little blogging space. Well, as I said before, I’m rusty as hell, so don’t expect me to give an A quality of blogging in this entry. I promise that I try to make this an easy read for all, but not to the extent of writing the way I used to write when I was 14.
Soooo, this 20 year old here has a lot on her mind that she would like to share with you guys.
Yesterday, while I was doing a minor spring cleaning, I came upon my (or rather my family’s) WWF Wrestlemania X-Seven VCD. And for those who know me, you know how much wrestling means to me. As much as it has dwindled into a corny state that it is sometimes hard to watch, I tune in occasionally to watch WWE when my ALL-TIME favourite wrestler is back on the show. That’s right, it’s Chris Muthafuckin Jericho!
But waaay before I became a die-hard fan of Jericho and when I unraveled the mystery to wrestling - being scripted, when I was about 12 to 13, wrestling has been damn real to me since my early childhood.
A little history lesson perhaps. At the age of 4 to 5, the tiny, scrawny and innocent Darilyn (yours truly) was exposed to the world of professional wrestling by a family. It was around 1997-1998ish as I recalled. That was also when wrestling was beginning to become extremely popular in Singapore. My whole family was watching it. Every CNY for a few years since, I was bodyslammed and chokeslammed or ankle-locked by my cousins in my grandma’s bedroom. Of course to their delight and to my horror. For god’s sake, I was ‘last ride’ and powerbombed on the bed! So the irony was violent TV was bonding everyone in my family.
But… there’s this one particular person who was a long-time fan, she’s the grandmummy (okay, it sounds kinda weird cuz I was trying to find the counterpart of granddaddy. but yeah, you get my point) of wrestling, it’s my grandmother (also affectionately known as “Ah Mah” in my family. Even though by the chinese family tree, I’m not supposed to call her as it is used to address the paternal’s grandma.).
Ah Mah was the coolest grandma I could ever wished for. She was IT. I lived with her from the day I was born and boy, did I not regret living with her. She was 70 years older than me, but there was something magical that we did together.
Anyway, long before Starhub cable tv? We had SCV. And that free-to-air Citytv channel or something. They aired wrestling all the time. Thankfully, most of the wrestling shows were on friday nights so I could stay up later and watch. It was amazing. Sometimes, when they were doing promos (i.e. interviews, talk segment etc), my grandma wouldn’t know what is going on so I had to translate it for her. To explain the drama and issues going on, firstly, we had to assign nicknames to the respective wrestler as she didn’t know their names.
Most of this wrestlers were in circa 2000-2001.
The Rock - Ah Lock (a bad pronunciation on the Rock)
Stone Cold Steve Austin - Botak (bald head)
The Undertaker - Dua Hia (Older brother)
Kane - Sio Di (Younger brother in hokkien. Sio could also mean hot - could be pun intended on Kane’s fiery character. lol)
Shane McMahon - Si Lang Kia (Fucked up kid)
Vince Mcmahon - Si Lang Kia Eh Lao Pei (Fucked up kid’s dad)
Linda McMahon - Si Lang Kia Eh Lao Bu (Fucked up kid’s mum in )
Stephanie McMahon - Si Lang Zha Bor (Fucked up woman)
Triple H - Si Lang Zha Bor Eh Ang (Fucked up woman’s husband)
Kurt Angle - Au Kah (Twisted leg. Cuz Angle’s finishing move was ‘ankle lock’)
Chris Benoit - Au Bin (Hurting the face. For his move was the ‘crippler cross face’)
Dudley Boyz - Gia Doh Deng (Taking tables. Y’know why. ;) )
These are the few that I can remember but there are a couple more. So even with my poorly translated stories, she was still able to comprehend and there was more substance to the feud and matches behind.
Oh yeah, I remembered when Hulk Hogan returned in 2002 for WM X8 to face The Rock, my grandma was yelling at the TV “HOGAN!!!”. Of course, I was too young to even know who he was and she told me how he was the pioneer when wrestling started (airing). It was kinda bittersweet for her as well.
Part of the reasons why we had all the PPV VCDs was because we bought them for my grandma to watch. On days with bad tv, I would usher her to her air conditioned room and play it for her to watch. And that I would scratch her back (it’s not funny, she always complained that she was feeling itchy) and we would watch together.
Thinking back, I really miss Ah Mah. It was unfortunate of what happened to her during her last 10 months but I’m glad that she’s relieved of the pain and a happier place, probably serving Buddha now.
The VCDs hold so many memories of us watching wrestling together. It was my grandma who got me into watching wrestling (much to the objection of my dad). My cousins have got over wrestling a long time ago - as they think it’s really lame and stupid, but I don’t think I can ever get over. I will still watch it 20 years from now because I like it (well, not as much as before).
Boomer Sooner,
Darilyn
*On a side note, the other English shows that my Ah Mah loved to watch were The Price Is Right and Wheel of Fortune. Not that she could get it, but she always liked watching them win prizes. So cute right?! She also enjoyed watching animal planet, national geographic etc and was fascinated by the wild animals.
I love my grandma, I really do. I miss her so much.
