I went to a Taylor Swift concert once, when she performed in Kuala Lumpur at the Putra Indoor Stadium Bukit Jalil in 2014. I was young and I thought it would be exciting and fun so I withdrew my savings and bought two of the cheapest tickets I could find.
Then I asked a work colleague to come along to keep me company. I offered her the ticket for free because I didn’t want to go alone into a crowded stadium and watch Taylor Swift all by myself. I thought, how sad it would be if I had to sing along to one of my favourite singers all alone but in a crowded stadium.
The said work colleague gave me a vague answer which I desperately took as a ‘yes’ seeing as I had no other close friends of my own to call. On the day of the concert we sat together in our cubicles, I asked if she was ready for Taylor Swift and in response, she gave me a vague look, a look that translates to, “I don’t actually want to go but I don’t know how to tell you because I feel bad, so I am going to leave it to you to figure it out for yourself.”
So I called up an ex-colleague, a gay man whom I consider a friend as we got along well when we worked together and would often go out for lunches and drinks. Although we hadn’t spoken for quite some time, he luckily said yes to my offer of a free Taylor Swift ticket and I breathed in relief knowing that I was going to the concert with a friend.
My little story has a sad ending, to be honest. When I saw my friend I was shocked at how skinny he was. I did not know it then but he was ill. Until today I cannot confirm what sickness he was suffering from. I only know that on that day I was so glad to see him.
He said he was doing okay and that his job was good. The concert was amazing although we were perched high up in the stadium with pillars sometimes blocking our view. We sang along and he was happy, and I was really glad to have someone with me who also enjoyed the show.
He became a Taylor Swift fan after that. He would often upload photos and updates on Facebook quoting her music and I would smile thinking that it was her concert that we went to that made him a fan.
A few years later I saw an update on Facebook that my friend had passed from pneumonia. I was shocked, sad and a little confused; my friend who was so positive and polished, always looking his best and always sounding so certain and so sure. He never once let anyone know that he was feeling badly, or if he was ill.
I sent my condolences to his family. I told them that we went to the Taylor Swift concert together, and how glad I was that we did.
I still think about him sometimes, he appears in my mind’s eye and I still hear his voice singing along to the songs performed at the concert. He was also a huge fan of Mariah Carey, and my other favourite memory of him was of us going to lunch in his car, and him singing with gusto to “We Belong Together”.
Rest in peace, YK. This blog post is for you. We will always have Taylor Swift.
Diana Abd is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
The User Content (as defined on Newswav Terms of Use) above including the views expressed and media (pictures, videos, citations etc) were submitted & posted by the author. Newswav is solely an aggregation platform that hosts the User Content. If you have any questions about the content, copyright or other issues of the work, please contact Newswav.
