Battle Royale: Matthews Brothers vs. drunken, skinny Malay (at Reggae Bar)
This Christmas/New Years, my family came to visit. I was super-stoked as my time in Malaysia has been the longest period of time I've gone without seeing them. Before my parents arrived, I took my brother to Langkawi (as a little Christmas present for him). We had fun driving around the island on motorbikes, seeing sites, and chillin on the beach. It was a great time to have some serious convos, hang out, and generally to get reacquainted with the smells of brotherhood. One night, we both decided to hit up the Reggae bar. We had been biking around a lot and we thought some time to sit back and listen to some fine music was in order. We had fun dancing and met some cool and not so cool people. After dancing with some African friends we had met (who were studying in Kuala Lumpur), we confronted a Malay guy who was getting a bit too familiar. He was a bit out of it and after an unsuccessful attempt to get him to chill out, things got real. Dave's version: This Malay guy was trying to shimmy up to some of our African friends and Dave laid down the law...just making sure the Malay dude knew that the girls did not want to dance with him and were just there to enjoy themselves with friends. After sensing a primordial and territorial male rage, the Malay dude picked a fight. Dave, wanting to be a peacemaker, threw up his arms and did not engage but apologized instead. After subsequent attempts to fight, Dave and I decided to leave. We made our way to our motorbike but of course, he followed us and blocked the exit leading to the main road. I was driving with Dave sitting on the back of the bike and we whizzed past this guy just as his friend couldn't hold him back. He took a swing at Dave (just grazing his back) and the bike wobbled to the left then to the right. I cut both feet, almost losing balance and having a total wipe-out, but was able to keep the bike in control and safely get away. I had deep gashes on my left and right big toes for the next two or three weeks--pretty brutal. Andrew's version*: Dave was getting his groove-thang on, mad peeps diggin his vibe. Checkin out the scene, I scopes some trouble brewin. "Dave, we best be leavin," I say. But Dave found his niche; he was unstoppable. This mini-Malay (Dave guessed 14 years old; I think he was probably 16) gets too familiar with some of our newly-met friends. Dave, reaffirming his earlier-established alpha-male status (with the exception of my superior status), taps the dude on the head. "Step off," Dave says.** Things got outta control fast. Malay guys started pouring out of the walls with bow staffs and knives. Dave sticks a napkin in a bottle and lights it on fire, throwing it only to see a huge mushroom cloud of flame ascend into through the bar. Ninjas were flyin all over, reggae gangsters were firing gats, and Dave, our African friends, and I were ducking to get to the exit. Mini Malay blocked the road with flaming tires and as we raced out on my bike, he bit my leg. We safely got away and for some reason Dave couldn't stop talking about fighting for the rest of the trip. It got kind of annoying (seriously Dave, I'm just saying...) but we had fun laughing about the experience.

No clear winner was decided, but Dave and I were pretty confident of what would've happened had things progressed:-)

*this version did not happen
**Dave never said this