My five-day experience at the middle/upper campus of International School of Kuala Lumpur was stellar. After one of my talks, a girl told me she’d heard me present (about two years ago)…at her Virginia middle school. First time I’m aware of that I’ve encountered a student twice—but on different continents.
One night, my kind host Beau Cain and his equally kind wife took me to dinner in Kuala Lumpur. Another first for me: ordering Thai food at an Irish pub (in Malaysia, no less).
The day I arrived, I’d heard from Malaysian radio personality Umapagan (Uma) Ampikaipakan, who does a popular drive-time show and also produces When We Last Left Our Heroes, a monthly radio show/podcast about the cultural influence of superheroes. He asked if I’d come on the show.
It was fun to discover that I have had professional dealings with several of the gents (Paul Levitz, Neal Adams, Brian Cronin, Arnold Blumberg) who have been on Uma’s show. Yet another first: I was the first guest on the show to be interviewed at the studio.
To get me back to my hotel, Uma ordered an Uber. When I got in the car (while Uma was upstairs on the air), the driver said “You’re not Uma.” Uma is a local celeb and I totally dashed the driver’s hopes. When I asked Vernon (his real name) how long it would take to walk to my hotel from the mall he was taking me to, he said he wasn’t sure. He elaborated: “In KL, only white people walk.”
At that mall, I visited the DC Superheroes store. Unlike most mall stores, it has two entrances:
Interestingly (though not in a good way), the store sells no comics and very little reading material.
This blog launched on 2/19/08.
Every
February 19, I share what I feel have been
the previous twelve months’ posts with the most.
This year’s elite:
transcends category
Bill Finger will now be officially credited on Batman
fans, celebrities, and media respond to Bill Finger credit announcement
Bill Finger credit begins to appear on TV shows and in comics
making the case that Bill Finger deserves co-creator status
top 10 pop culture moments of 2015
interviews
Robert vanMaanen, who as a boy in the early 1970s befriended his neighbor, Bill Finger
Lee Ann Marie, the girl in the video for the 1984 Survivor song “I Can’t Hold Back”…and the unofficial 2015 sequel video
Howard Murphy, who played the first live-action Green Lantern (in the two-part 1979 TV special Legends of the Superheroes)
speaking
feedback: Tennessee Association of School Librarians conference 2015
feedback: Charlotte S. Huck Children's Literature Festival 2015
feedback: University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg Children’s Literature Conference 2015
how I got to the American Association of School Librarians 2015 conference
mentioning a person is gay in rural Tennessee schools
research
what Bill Finger left behind
publishing
Proust Questionnaire: Kidlit Edition
your life is nonfiction
my book dedications
my picture book pantheon
miscellaneous
Co-Creator, the (first) play about Bill Finger
visiting the Taj Mahal (don’t miss the time-lapse video) and the site where Gandhi was assassinated
Bill Finger action figure
wordplay with “Bill,” “Finger,” and “bat” in Bill the Boy Wonder
a mural tribute to the 1970s Sea World water skiing superheroes show
my college paper on The New Yorker magazine
me at famous historical sites
the Phi Beta Kappa cartoon controversy
rejections for my cartoons
two published insults to Bill Finger, one early and one posthumous
superheroes who are not called superheroes
I was a teenage photographer
I thought I learned the name “Kuala Lumpur” from Jurassic Park, but I can’t find confirmation online and don’t have the book handy. In any case, I’m here now, speaking for seven days at the International School of Kuala Lumpur—the first school I’ve seen that has both a turtle and koi pond on site. Or, for that matter, either.
I connected in Dubai, and as I have seen on past trips to parts of Asia, they cap the boarding process with the spraying of insecticide.
The Petronas Towers, the world’s tallest buildings from 1998 to 2004, were the tallest buildings visible from my hotel room. At night they look ghostly.
And unlike American skyscrapers, they don’t stay lit all night.
Inside one lobby in the towers, I saw an advertisement for a superhero symphony.
When I learned a place called Batu Caves was a 30-minute subway ride away, I could not resist. It’s one of the most visited Hindu shrines outside India. It’s also one letter off from my favorite of all caves.
This area on the subway platform would warm the heart of any author (though in KL, everything is warm all the time).
En route, I encountered a couple of signs that drew attention from other Westerners as well.
From inside the entrance of the Dark Cave (part of the Batu Caves complex), you can look into the distance and see the Petronas Towers.
Views from either side of the biggest cave:
More glimpses of Batu:
Passing a pharmacy counter back at the mall at the base of Petronas Towers, I saw a book you won’t find laying around your average CVS.
My favorite of their ‘80s hits is a tie between “Rio” and “The Reflex.” I didn’t know they run juice bars, too.
At the base of KL Tower (which resembles Seattle’s Space Needle) is the last remnant of what used to be on the site of KL: rain forest.
You can enter and
wander freely. On the canopy walk throughout part of the forest, I saw a
few others, but back on the ground, I was alone.
I found out the weird way that if you don’t exit by 5 p.m., they lock you in—and some people on the outside don’t lift a finger to let you out.
One guy (whom I believe was an employee of the park/grounds) sitting at one locked exit instructed me to “go around”—but I had no idea what that meant exactly, so I walked back about 20 minutes till I found the only other exit I was sure I could find. That was locked, too.
Two other surprised guys showed up on my side of the gate, and we all waited while someone went to find a key. After a short while passed with no sign of rescue, I considered climbing over and probably could have, if not for my hands being slick with sweat and the bars being metal. Luckily, the gatekeeper eventually did return.
And all that was just Sunday.
I walked a lot farther than I realized.
The next day was my first of seven at ISKL. Another adventure begins…
I hand-carried 76 books. By day three, I had sold them all but did not bring enough.
Thank you, ISKL for bringing me to KL, which I find easy and enjoyable to explore.
On 2/9/16, the day after Bill Finger’s 102nd birthday, I had the privilege of speaking for the third time at the 92nd Street Y in New York City.
Midtown Comics kindly agreed to help me spread word (look for the little flyer they put out).
But otherwise, in the days just prior, it seemed like forces were conspiring against me.
The previous week, I was speaking at schools and a conference in Denver. My flight back east was a Saturday night red-eye with a three-hour layover in Phoenix. I landed in Philadelphia Sunday morning at 6 a.m….but the suitcase I gate-checked did not. Apparently three hours was not enough time to transfer it from one plane to another, and it was still in Arizona.
Complicating this, I was not staying in Philadelphia—I was traveling on to Connecticut for two days of helping my mother downsize. That meant they would have to drive the bag farther than typical—or put it on another flight, then drive it.
Further complicating this, I’d packed my winter coat and gloves in my suitcase.
In two thin layers and a T-shirt, I took Amtrak to Connecticut. While you were watching the Super Bowl, I was cleaning out my mom’s storage unit, making multiple trips to the dumpster. On one of those trips, I tripped—rather slipped. Ice ice baby.
I expected my bag would have been delivered by evening, but no such luck. I called American Airlines. A rep said it appeared that my bag was in Philadelphia but could not tell me with certainty. So much for tracking numbers and computers.
The next day was also dedicated to helping my mom—during a snowstorm. In between, I called American multiple times, reminding them that I would be leaving Connecticut early Tuesday morning so the bag had to be delivered by Monday night. Each rep told me something different, giving me the impression that no one knew anything.
The one outfit I had with me was more suitable for manual labor than for presenting at the 92Y. So on Monday night, with still no sign of my bag, I Ubered to Marshalls in the snow to buy a new shirt, pants, and belt.
Then I called American yet again, this time giving them the delivery address where I was headed next. Two reps told me that my bag was still in Philly and I was updating my info in time. Still, I had a feeling that the bag would be delivered at the Connecticut address an hour after I left.
Tuesday morning, I left a note, then left.
An hour later, a courier called me. He was standing in front of my sign, asking for the new address (and no doubt assuming it was elsewhere in the same town).
My bag was rerouted again, arriving at the new address the following morning.
After I thanked the courier, he texted me “I’m glad it all worked out for you. Have a nice life.”
I started my 92Y presentation with this story, then showed Batman’s emblem and said “Now a story of real drama.”
The crowd (before a few more came in):
During Q&A, an elderly woman said she was a friend of Bob Kane’s and felt I villainized him. I tried to assure that I am not passing judgment on the man as a relative or friend; I did not know him personally. But I stood by my assessment of him as a professional—someone who took advantage and lied. After the talk, I signed books and she came up to me to ask if I partner with her and write a book based on a concept she had.
The 92Y talk was also the occasion on which we resumed filming a documentary begun in 2008 with Time (the now-defunct film division of the magazine), then put on hold, then resumed in 2011 with A&E Indie Films, then put on hold again. Soon I will reveal the details on this, including why it went on hiatus and what content provider we have newly partnered with.
Afterward, friends from different chapters in my life (youth group, first job, comics colleagues) decamped for a bite at a nearby restaurant I chose because of its name: The Milton.
Then I went back to my pod hotel (first time), happy at having had another chance to tell Bill’s story.
Thank you to the 92Y’s Christine Chen for hosting me, and thanks to all who attended. Watch your step, watch your bag, and before year’s end, when the doc comes out, you’ll be able to watch a portion of this talk.
2/11/16 addendum: Thanks also to Heidi MacDonald and Alexander Lu at The Beat for this humbling coverage.
