Infamous vs not famous

I met a senior from high school during a short-course last week. He looked familiar and his name sounded familiar, so when we were placed in the same discussion group, I took that opportunity to check whether or not my initial thought that we were from the same school was right. He confirmed it – yes, we went to the same school and he was a year senior than me.

When it came to seniors a year ahead of me, I normally would mention my brother-in-law’s name as the point of reference – “sama batch dengan Talhah, kan?” If it’s a few years more senior, then I’ll use my sister-in-law’s name instead – “sama batch dengan Kak Telaah, kan?” My husband, who’s sandwiched between these two seniors of mine, (thankfully) went to Kisas instead. Though I never even dreamed of someday marrying someone related to my schoolmates, sometimes, having relatives from the same school could come in handy, even if it’s just as a point of reference…

Anyway, back to the high school senior (who’s now my junior in PTD service), upon learning of my batch, he asked whether I was in the same batch with a few girls. I confirmed it, yes, I was in the same batch with those girls. Not surprisingly, all the names mentioned belonged to a bunch of popular/pretty girls.

When I met my brother-in-law and mentioned it, he told me a story that was kind of an eye-opener for me. According to him, the real reason guys from his batch remembered this particular group of girls was due to an incident involving a guy from his batch. Apparently, the guy had been strictly questioned by an ustaz on what he had done to one particular girl. The guy had no idea on what it was all about and was astonished to be grilled rather harshly by the ustaz. The ustaz then explained that the girl in question had an episode of hysteria in which she kept calling for his names.

I’m not sure whether or not the two ever got on as a couple – but the girl had been notoriously noticed by the guy’s whole batch as the one who kept shouting his name when she had hysteria. And since she belonged to a group of rather pretty girls, other girls in her group became equally well-known.

The hysteria episode was over long ago, but the girl is still remembered for that. In contrast, my senior did not recognise me at all when I introduced myself as his junior. Partly because he went out of the school after form three when he did not do well in Arabic; partly because I only began to mingle more with my male seniors after I entered form four due to various clubs’ and societies’ activities and was a virtual unknown prior to that.

Still, between being famous for some infamous reasons and practically unheard of – I’ll choose being anonymous any day.