Boys and warfare

When we finished our classes, we play war. All elements of boyhood come together when you are playing war. War was big. Bigger than big. Girls never played, or if they did, they just wanted to play nurses. Our gang - our whole life was based on warfare.

I had toy soldiers. I think war for boys only exists because the toys are so much fun. Who wouldn't want to shoot a machine gun? Or go sixty miles an hour on a twelve tonne tank? Can you blame the General for buying weapons by the hundreds even if they don't work? You know those Generals get films about new weapons that are real slick, then they sit in the dark screening room, wearing uniforms heavily decorated with badges and medals, going, "Hey, neat"

I love Combat. Vic Morrow on Combat was like an idol to boys at our age. We made forts with wooden boxes. One kid I knew built a fort in front of his house with piano boxes. It was impregnable. So we took stones, bottles, newspapers and anything to bring it down. It got a little rowdy and Munich passed me some newspapers stuffed into an empty bottle to hurl towards the impregnable fort. I didn't realise that he lit the end with a matchstick. It stuck in the side and set the fort on fire. The kids in the fort were stumbling to get out and I was the big hero because I had actually knocked out a fort and nearly burned and shot four children in the process.

It was an accident, I swear.

The making of a bully

At school, we also had fights. By the time we were in primary four classes, Munich the "Tarantula" was always in the "ring" with somebody. He'd get pissed at some poor guy and the word would spread around school. Eventually Munich will find his latest victim and taunted him openly. Smack! A couple of blasts to the face, a little blood. Fighting was a way to rechannel young boy's unused sexual energy.. at least it was a physical contact. It was a better way to release aggression than today's drive-by shootings.

I only fought with my sisters, except for once, when I fought a timid guy called Ah Fook. He hit my buddy, so I made him sit in an ant pile. That's creative retaliation. Then his brother came and chased me up a tree.