i woke up today to find out from google news that michael jackson is dead.
i grew up knowing and loving MJ. some special sunday mornings at my old house, my grandmother would throw open the sliding glass doors and someone would put on our laser disc of Michael Jackson’s Dangerous album. we would all sit around the living room table eating kuaci, joking, laughing, as MJ’s energetic tunes and crisp voice filled the room. and instead of playing crashing and clanging festive music during Chinese New Year, we would always opt for our MJ laser discs. the kids (ie me) really loved dancing to Black or White and Thriller. at one point i knew all the words to the rap portion of Black or White, and would irritate my Cantonese-speaking grandmother to bits whenever i jumped onto the dining chairs and started rapping english gibberish at her.
where your blood comes from / is where your space is / i’ve seen the bright get duller / i’m not gonna spend my life being a color!
the Michael Jackson concert in Stadium Merdeka was the first and only concert i’ve been to with my parents. i dont know why my parents decided to bring me, cos i was really young and couldnt really have appreciated the show very much, but i’m glad they did. i feel so lucky that that they did. for my own personal reasons, that night was a really glitzy and special one for me. what a night. i was sandwiched between my parents clutching one of those concert souvenir plastic mugs, staring down in awe at MJ, all the way up there from the bleachers. maybe he will do the moonwalk, my mother nudged me and said, and i remember asking, what is a moonwalk? issit like when he slides backwards on the floor? yes yes, it’s like that. did he do it at the concert? i dont remember. but i do know that to this day people still go, wah, moonwalk, whenever they see an old video of MJ doing his thing, even if they’ve already seen the moonwalk an infinite number of times.
i was really angry when i logged into twitter to see some really insensitive remarks about MJ’s death. “RIP MJ’s nose” and “be happy everyone; our dreams wont be haunted by MJ’s nose anymore”, and the most repulsive one yet, “farrah fawcett went to heaven and asked that all children on earth be safe, so god killed michael jackson”. disgusting and so disrespectful. just because he put up with a lot of media shit and public humiliation does not mean it’s okay to further ridicule him at his death.
and then there are those who passed comments along the lines of, “oh last time everybody make fun of MJ, and now they all miss him, stfu lah”. really? who is this everybody? the only people i know who made fun of MJ’s nose, skin and alleged crimes are the ones who are making the same jokes about his death, and these people didnt care about him or his impact in the first place. someone tweeted this incredulous comment agreeing that MJ fans are hypocrites because “it’s too late to miss him anyway”. isnt it always too late to miss the dead? would this person rather that people didnt pay tribute to MJ?
take a look around — people are gathering in public places to pay homage to the king of pop, buying out his CDs everywhere, playing his music at the office and at home, writing tributes to him… and a couple of random people who dont care about MJ decide to take it upon themselves to declare that the world actually doesnt care either, and are all just faking their sadness. please lah okay. there are many of us fans who never once believed the allegations about him, and even for those who did and consequently made fun of him, you cannot tell them they dont have a right to pay tribute to MJ. relationships to music and its inspiration is sacred and personal; who are you to say that paying tribute to an idol — a musical genius, a virtuoso, a world-changing artiste who always stood up for humanity and charity — is hypocritical? many of us grew up staring at the ceiling after school, listening to his crooning that always made us feel better and taught us new things; many of us derived simple joy from watching him dance.
this all reeks of people who dont give two hoots about Iran and choose to believe that no one else actually cares about Iran either, and that everyone is just playing up their concern to sound educated. why do people always resort to such odd justifications when they simply just dont care about something the rest of the world cares about? if you dont care, dont; just dont imply that no one else cares — or thinks about — these things.
(i really hate myself for getting angry today. sorry. i really shouldnt have.)
MJ MJ MJ. we have so many memories of you. in standard 6, Syafiq used to twirl around the classroom executing perfect imitations of your dance moves, and we used to shriek in laughter whenever he did the crotch-and-tiptoe thing.
in standard 1, my classmates and those from 1 Dahlia did an awesome pirate-themed dance number of Beat It at our annual concert, which incidentally was the last annual concert our school ever had. some seniors in secondary school taught us and our class teachers the dance moves in the old 4th floor studio that was soon dismantled. Johannas was the evil swashbucklin’ pirate! i wish i still had the tape of that concert.
my cousin Eva and i used to sing Heal the World before we fell asleep after a long night of little girl chat. our aunt had these Michael Jackson cassettes that we would slip into the radio and sing along to when our aunt left the house. simple joys.
everybody in Starbucks used to dab at their eyes with tissue during Christmas season, when the carolers would go around the cafes of Bangsar singing an absolutely beautiful and sincere rendition of We Are The World. sometimes we would run up to them and sing along with them too, taking pictures and laughing.
once, we went to a home for disabled children in Teluk Intan to paint them a beautiful mural to brighten up their home. when it was a time for break, the homekeepers put on some music so that we could all dance with the kids. everybody went wild when MJ’s music came on. hands flailing, hip swinging, egyptian-move-making… MJ, i guess that’s how we do your moonwalk.
everybody loved you in their own little ways.
i found this picture online and thought that it would be an apt dedication to MJ:
from here.
everyone knows that MJ is a manchild. i often wonder how scared and lonely he must have felt in the midst of all the accusations and cruel press coverage, whether they were true or not. i guess it’s a good thing that he’s free from all the speculation now; and i suspect that he’s having a great time moonwalking and going, “ow!” wherever he is :)
rest in peace, Michael Jackson, king of pop and my first love. thank you for the music and the inspiration.
