A Tribute to A Great Friend.

Greetings all and I am back,

Its been a long long long time since I last wrote, but its been hard times and I just could not find the words to write for the next post.

As you all may have known, Joshua and I have lost a great brother and friend to us and I thought it would be nice to just give my late good ol pal a dedicated post on the geekier side of him and what interests he had in terms of Nerdy stuff.

My dear friend Qamarul would always like to deny that he is a nerd. He would always be stating that he's got a rep to uphold. However, I reckon that despite his so-call "rep", his nerdy nature doesn't seem to go away even in Social gathering situations.

One of his distinct nerdy interest that he shared fervently with the other guys in my group was the whole Star Wars culture. While I was never really a Star wars fan as compared to the rest of my guy friends, I can safely say that that was the only one thing that we didn't really have in common. (Well, then again, there was Warhammer which was something he really never truly appreciate and would do anything to run away from :p)


(Dorkman vs Ryan, an Infamous Lightsaber Youtube Video that stood out for its effects and choreography)

Despite my lack of true fanaticism for Star Wars, I could say I was very much in love with the concept of the Jedi and their ultimate Light Saber Duels.

I could even say that it actually did help developed our friendship back in the younger years of our high school days. Back then, We'd choreograph Lightsaber fights using the wooden pole as substitute light sabers that we detached from dustpans. In doing so, we would mimic fights just like the one shown in the above YouTube video.

Aside from Star Wars, Qamarul had a great appreciation for pretty much everything that we collected or even played. While he wasn't a collector of anything, he was a "do-er", getting involved in playing nerdy board games like Battlestar Galactica, to watching epic 80s and 90s cartoons and movies like Conan the Barbarian to Transformers the Movie.


Definitely an Adama fan for sure. I can still recall him chanting Adama's name along with the rest of us for no reason whatsoever during our New Year Countdown.


It does make me smile now recalling the times when I had to keep a watchful eye for my Cheeky pal as he was always looking for loopholes or ways to play CHEAT in the game. Either that or he was unpredictable in the BSG Boardgame which made it all the more exciting.


Here we see Qamarul forced under duress to take pics of us showing off our nerdy boardgame extravaganza.

Ahh but the good ol buddy of mine never strays from being in the movement of nerdom. While he doesn't collect like how Josh Me or Weiting, he has played an influential role to the collection of nerdy stuff that I have.

Back in the days when I was just starting up my Model Kit collection in 1997, I had no idea on where to look or how to find out what war machines were modern day era and what was not. This was a time when the information super highway was still at its infancy and I had to rely on encyclopedias and the library to get what I needed to know. 5 years into my interest in all thing military and I got my 56k Modem, something made me delve even more into it.

One of the big catalyst that sped me to develop more into the Modern Military Enthusiast I am today (aside from being influenced by my Dad in the early years) was the endless playing of Battlefield 1942 with Qamarul.



Eventually, they had a mod (before Battlefield 2) that got me hooked into developing my modern military collection further. Obviously, it was the crazy experience that Qam and the rest of us shared in the game that really got me going.



Once Battlefield 2 came up, we had great bonding session burning the midnight oil and playing this game as an awesome fighting team. More often, we would play special forces where Me, Weiting, Joshua and Qamarul would be a four men team fighting insurmountable numbers of enemies to win the game in the Battlefield 2 Special Forces edition.

Those were the good old days with lots of yelling and covering each other's asses during those pressure cooker scenarios.

One of the other influential and memorable occasions that I had with Qamarul were our long debates and discussion on Warrior Culture of the ancient times. From the History of the Crusades, Knights, Saracens to the Warrior Culture of the Samurai, these were many fundamental experiences I had with him that led me to expand my mind on ancient warfare and the various culture around it.


Of which, Knights were the starting piece of my Warhammer collection if you all had no already known by now.



Qamarul had a strong sense of interest in the way of the Samurai and Bushido. This was due to the fact that he had a strong passion for the martial arts, especially Aikido. He got meinto it and it was also one of the influential things that got me interested in Japanese culture.

I can still recall the times he would be playing the theme song of the Last Samurai over and over again on his car stereo. We do joke about how it is always a White guy coming into Asian Culture and within a short span of time, emerges as the supreme hero but that is a another story for another day.

I leave off now to say tht my best bud has given me many memories. Memories I would share to my kids and grandkids of a friendship as true as it could ever be. A Nerd who enjoy the companionship of his friends and who is always there to enjoy, support and help out his fellow mates. He is a guy who never fails to uplift the spirits of all with his jokerish antics and one who has greatly touch my life.

Will sorely miss u bro,



Take care Qam.. I will see ya later..
And You will always be in my heart...

NERD SALUTE!