A Friendly Trip Down Memory Lane

I had read two articles from my friend’s blogs, both of whom were my university mates…. Adzwan had written about his university days, and all the cherished memories that he held so dear. Javard had written about Turning 30, which also included his days at university…. I had the idea of writing something similar, however for some reason the spark of inspiration was not there……

Then I watched season 10 of Friends… Let me backtrack a bit, I had bought the final season of Friends as soon as it came out….. I kept hounding the DVD guy, even leaving my handphone number for him to call me as soon as it came out! Anyway, I found myself with some free time last week and I decided to watch the whole final season all over again…….

Anyone can safely say, that Friends is without a doubt one of the biggest (if not the biggest) show of the late 20th century…. Everyone loved watching them….. 6 virtual unknowns (well except probably for Courtney Cox whom up until that point was immortalized as the girl Bruce Springsteen pulled up on stage) became huge megastars, commanding huge paychecks….. An almost unprecedented $1 million (apart from Frasier & Seinfeld) per episode….. The beauty of Friends was more than the fact that it was a funny comedy about 6 good looking people living it up in New York City…. At its core, it was a show with a lot of heart….. Here was a bunch of people who were the best of friends, who genuinely loved each other and would do anything for each other…..

I would remember Friends more for its poignant moments than its funny ones, Ross secretly volunteering to take Rachel to the prom, Ross missing out on an appearance with Discovery Channel to help Rachel out, Phoebe’s little speech to her triplets, Chandler screwing up the marriage proposal until he went back to the apartment to find Monica to what turned out as one of the best season endings ever…..

Suddenly a wave of nostalgia hit me…. HARD….. A kaleidoscope of memories came flashing through my mind….

I remember renting Friends from our local Blockbuster and watching it with my friends…..

I remember watching the latest episodes of Friends which one of our friends had taped on Sky (to the uninformed Sky was the “Astro” of British television, something us poor undergrads had no access too) : (

I remember certain happenings on Friends mirrored what had happened in real life…… For example, there was an episode where the three girls had pored over a copy of Playboy…. I remembered some girlfriends and I had borrowed one of our friend’s copy of Playboy just to see what the fuss was all about (surprisingly there were a lot of interesting articles in it … I KID you not!!!!)

I remember the episode where Monica, Phoebe, Joey & Chandler were stuck in Monica’s room and the girls had performed a waxing job on Joey… One of my allegedly more macho guy friends had asked us to do the same, just to see how painful it was……The expression on his face was PRICELESS!!!!

I remember endless conversations with my friends about each episode, laughing over the jokes, imitating the characters.......

I remember a particular conversation with Javard where he said Monica’s scene with the “7s” was probably one of the best scripts in the whole entire show….

I remember C (bukan nama sebenar) and myself used to quote Friends all the time, which led a lot of people to think that we were really really weird…..

I remember searching for similar clothes that Rachel had worn on the show, I thought she had a phenomenal wardrobe!

Friends, without a doubt, played an instrumental part in our lives…… Yes it was only a TV show, but a major part of our lives revolved around the show….. no we are not sad people… really :-)

Even until now, Friends references crop up in our daily conversation…..

I had a major bimbo moment last week, and as I was telling the story to my friends I ended it by saying I felt like Joey …..

Two days ago, we had a conversation about clothes and A (juga bukan nama sebenar) had mentioned that she would line up her work clothes and wear them in that order….. We had likened her to Monica……..

My boss had asked me whether he can borrow my latest season of friends….. (guys the cool one not the other one kay)

Friends was more than a TV show, it also brought people closer together….. It certainly did with my own set of people…. And as I was watching the montage I was suddenly reminded of my own life, and my own cherished memories with my friends…. And for that I am deeply grateful……..