So today was my first day at the Asian Games in Jakarta, Indonesia and I watched the badminton quarterfinals, there were two Malaysian men’s doubles pairs left in the game.

My idea was to find the Malaysian group to cheer for our players because the Indonesian crowd is always crazyyyyyyy and I was certain that there would be a group for sure. Nope. So I was surrounded by a bunch of Indonesians during the first Malaysia vs Indonesia match and didn’t dare to cheer loudly lols. But I saw a man with our flag and a small drum at the opposite hahahaha, very hardcore.

So for the second match, I decided to join the man at the opposite side. When I got there, he wasn’t there but I saw the Malaysian flag so I sat in front of that flag. When the second Malaysia vs Indonesia match was starting, he came back.

Me: hi are you Malaysian?

Him: yeah you too?

Me: ya i saw you from the opposite so i decided to join you cos i was alone there

Him: oh okay okay come come. So we have a very important job here, we are ambassadors of our country now. So there are three components okay, we have the flag, the kompang (a small drum), and the loudspeaker. So when I hit the drum, you will wave the flag okay. You have to wave it because then the camera will record us. And then we have to do some PR work [there was another hardcore Indonesia supporter beside us] to let the other people at the stadium know that we have good relations. Also we have to save our voice cos there’s only the two of us so I will start yelling through the microphone when it quiets down and you’ll wave the flag and yell too, okay?

Me: okay.

After that I had the most fun I’ve had in a while, I think it was more fun than supporting our players with the home crowd in Malaysia.

Every time the Malaysians won a point, he will hit his kompang then yell “MALAYSIA BOLEH!” and I’ll raise the flag and wave it frantically and yelled the same stuff. Then the stadium will be roaring with “IN-DO-NE-SIA” to drain our cheers out.

Needless to say, we attracted a lot of attention: some people were filming us, some people yelled with us, most of them booed at us, and I think we were captured on TV. Soon after, the crowd seemed to realise that we’d shout our motto whenever it quieted down…so after a while there was basically no more silent slots for us to slot in our yells of encouragement.

In the end, it wasn’t just Malaysia vs Indonesia on the court, but also Malaysia vs Indonesia off court, though it was the 2 of us against possibly thousands The Malaysians lost the badminton matches; idk about the latter.