God brothers - is there such a thing and who cares?

I wasn't blessed with a large immediate family. It was just my bro and me and of coz our parents. We were a tight knit family. My Dad was a very strong family man. He always ensured we had enough to eat or wear or just well taken care of. I was very close to my friends from school or work (yes you can have life long friends from work!). One of such friend from work became my very good friend that even our families were also close.
I met Alex Fong at Microsoft where I first joined back in 95-96. I entered my new office on 1 April (how apt dat it was April Fool's Day) dressed in a new white shirt and tie. I went to my place and realized that I didnt have my notebook with me. However, next to my station was a PC connected to a Microsoft Joystick and a game called "Mech Warrior" loaded. So in my cleanest white shirt and tie, i sat down and started to play. In walked a guy with a mini mullet, rocker T-shirt, torn jeans with a look that says he just woke up and he gave me this coldest stare. I realized afterwards that I was sitting at his place but at dat point my MechWarrior was chasing down this renegade Mech and I didnt have time to care about some sleepy head rocker punk. So I carried on playing for another hour or so. Alex sat down next to me and in an hour, just turned to me and asked "Who the hell are you?". It was our first words!!

Alex offered to take me out to lunch on my first day. It was pretty cool to have your colleague do that. So I followed him to the swankiest and most elegant.....McDonald's in Jalan Raja Chulan at Menara Weld. We ordered at the counter (in case you were frozen since the ice age and havent been to a McD's) and in a macho, cool, deep drawl he turned over to me and said "Eh, you got money ah? I left my wallet at home la!". So i paid for our lunch.

Alex got married after a while to Sharon, who happens to be the sister of one of my school friends. We later found out that our ages were the same. Alex and I were born in the same year as were our wives. We then started hanging out together by going out on weekends and then on a holiday to Langkawi. The coolest thing about our friendship was not about the adults but about our sons. Mike (my son) and Share were born 4 days apart and these boys just started clicking and hanging out as early as I can remember.

Since Alex and I were first borns and we were married early (let that be a lesson to you), we didnt have anyone who could make suitable God Parents for our kids and becoz de boys were 4 days apart, we decided that we would be God Parents to the other's son. So Shane became our God son and Mike was theirs. Not only did both boys never fought, they always seem to have a great time together.

When the boys were one, we took them to Cameron and stayed in this old chalet with a fire place. The boys just learned to run and Mike ran past Shane without touching him....poor Shane just dropped on his butt. The wind from hurricane Mike must have taken him out. Mike came back to help his friend up but both just fell back down. When the boys were about 2+, they were playing in a playground and a bigger girl came and pushed Shane but Mike stood in front of Shane and told the girl not to mess with them.

Shane moved to Seattle about 5 years ago when Alex got a great opportunity at Microsoft Corp and the boys were very sad at the airport. Mike actually teared. They do write each other sometimes, send birthday gifts and now will IM via a webcam. They will play games online and just kinda hang out but the time difference is a bit of a challenge. Both Shane and Mike take up Tae Kwan Do but Mike looks like one of those stick characters that we use to draw in kindergarten and Shane has grown to be a really cool, good looking and well built kid. Looks like he can kick some ass and protect Mike.

Everytime Shane gets back, they pick up from where they left off. It's like they were never apart. They have only seen each other twice and I know Shane wants us to go to Seattle but its not like driving to Kepong la!! For those of you who dont follow world events, Kepong is a 20min drive from our place.

I too miss my friends dearly and I do hope that our sons will continue to be friends and in this case God Brothers even across the miles. So is there such thing as a God Brother? Officially no but where love is present, it doesnt matter.