I'd like to begin this post by saying today has been a good day for me, and also for Team Payne of course, looking into everything paintball from my drive from Cyberjaya to what I call Damansara Paintball Ave., all the way back to HQ and burning the midnight oil with my trusty laptop I call Samaire (Pronounced Sah-mee-rah), named after Samaire Armstrong, that hot little chick from The O.C., Dirty Sexy Money, and Entourage.
Anyways, for the guys who I've never met, you may realize by now, aku suka cakap banyak, but if it helps, I'm just getting warmed up before getting down to the bizzznessss. For Faisal (Jijoy) and Sulhi, who have probably scrolled down tarus to look at the pictures, make sure you READ THE IMPORTANT PARTS AS WELL. By the way, this post will be in the form of narration and storytelling by yours truly.
Thank you.
Okay, first of all, I dropped down to Napshot Paintball with Mr. Raekwon just to compare equipment and marker prices from ansgear.com for dye and proto stuff, since I shall be planning to makan rumput when I splurge my next allowance in equipment for the upcoming ISSC; we'll be playing for exposure right? Might as well look good for the pictures. It was supposed to be a quick get-in, get-out procedure. But as luck would have it, Allan (who I thought was a sales assistant at the time) came up to me and asked if I needed any help. I mentioned to him that I was just browsing through products and if it was okay for me to take pictures, and I added that me and my team mates (kamu!) would be interested in looking at gear for the upcoming tournament we'll be participating in in May. As soon as I mentioned that we were form Brunei, he was all smiles and said,
"Oh, Brunei!"
"We haven't seen you guys in ages," said Allan. "That's awesome, we've been waiting to see you guys out".
This came as a nice surprise for me, since my visit last week was met with the workers there not giving me face and that actually made me bias to the accommodation SPA gave me. Anyway, he brought me to the counter and we sat down and asked what's been going on in the whole Brunei paintball scene. I told him how it's making a comeback, seeing how we've been quite active in a way comparing with the dead-zone paintball's had since Black September '07. Aside from that, the Bruneian produced MadPaintball UK tournament made waves all the way here, and it came to no surprise to Allan. We had to move to a corner spot soon after this big dude came and sat next to us, blaring loudly on his phone and we continued discussing major plans for paintball in Brunei and our team's plans in the next couple of months.
'Allan' turned out to be Mr. Allan Phang; International Liaison of PALS - Paintball Asia League Series. FYI, PALS is sanctioned by The United Paintball Federation (UPBF), Asia Pacific Paintball Federation (APPBF), Paintball Sports Promotion (PSP) and the Millenium. In a nutshell, this guy's a member of the Big Guns, in terms of international paintball admin of course. Also, they're the guys in charge of bringing in Paintball World Cup Asia in November (I'm confident Al-Kapitan will be looking into that too?)
Our region's Big Gun - Holds Malaysia, India, Philippines, Myanmar, Iran,
Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore and Japan Paintball Associations.
Allan then shouts out to the big guy who was blaring on the phone, "Paul! Team from Brunei!".
"Oh! Brunei!!"
So 'Paul' (who's off the phone by now), turns out to be Paul Lam, FOUNDER of PALS. Bam. He repeats whatever Allan mentioned about how Brunei's been away from the paintball circuit for ages, and it's about high-time we brought in some Brunei blood in the tournaments. He mentioned loads on his meetings with Dr. Aamton, 'The Smoking Doctor', Black September '07 and all, and he's happy Team Payne's gotten the ball rolling again with this Bruneian team getting active with the sport.
So that was the introductory part of my first 10 minutes stepping into Napshot Paintball. Next, Simon the vendor walks towards me and introduces himself. After a bit of chit-chat, he offered us a team package (sort of like a sponsorship deal if you think about it, seeing how much of a steal it is. Please check your facebook inbox if you haven't already!) with the '09 Proto line.
Proto '09 Jersey (Blue)
Proto '09 Jersey (Red)
Proto Axis Goggle System
Further shots from NP.
Dye '09 Jersey
Dye Attack Pack Harness
Dye Rhino Tank Cover
I4 Goggle System White Camo (I like!)
Dye Rotor Loader Stock
Dye Rotor Loader - White Camo!
Dye Barrel Collection
Deathstix Barrel Collection
Empire Magna Rotor Loader
Ninja HPA Tank - Comes in 68s.
Empire Prophecy Rotor Loader
Nappyboy & Paul Lam (awu, cawie sul ku)
Aside from the great discount we got from Napshot Paintball, next I'd like to talk about our exposure. As we all know, we will be gearing up for the ISSC in May, it's good to see that the rest of the team has been catching up with training in Miri the past couple of weeks (and yes, I'd like to sit in for training when I head back in April, thank you very much!), Allan actually brought up TWO outlets we may be able to get our hands on.
To keep our experience up, there's the MPOC - the Malaysian Paintball Official Circuit held by PALS (and no, not the Malaysian Palm Oil Council if you tried googling it up).
The MPOC has 5 Legs, stretching from January to October. It's in a league format, where points are accumulated in all games played by the team. Awesome part is, in terms of exposure and our time and financial considerations, according to Allan we will be able to register in any of the Legs mentioned in the dates. BUT, the Best part? Paul told me that if we can show proof of air tickets of at least 5 team members, we will not have to pay for registration and will be given 3 free paintball boxes. That's right, you'd only have to pay for flight tickets and food since you'll be free to stay over at my place. And of course, *cough* a carton of ciggies *cough*. =D
Aside from that, there's also the Cyberjaya Paintball Championship League, where the format's the same, but on a slightly different time frame. They didn't mention the free registration though!
That's pretty much the awesome part of the paintball trip I did today, went to SPA, but then prices were still quite high and for us noobs, wasn't really much of a visit. It was busy since there were a lot of customers. Any other product price we can discuss on our FB Inbox ayte.
That's pretty much it this time, will update again soon hopefully. Currently waiting for further correspondence and final confirmation on info given by Allan. In the meantime, I hope to hear from you lot back at home! Oh, watched Green Zone last night, I recommend to those of you still clinging onto Modern Warfare 2. heheh. Lastly, I'd like to mention to the rest of us, I'm guessing PALS and the other opposing teams will be looking out for us once we all actually meet up here, so there's a lot of hope and expectations on us (cue for Band Of Brothers theme), InsyaAllah we'll be able to do well, and I was wondering what the team would think of a bit of exposure to the public of our antics on tourney day? Was thinking maybe Borneo Bulletin and Brunei Times? Will discuss!
"Oh, Brunei!"
Cheerio,
Nappyboy.
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