[COLUMNIST] The last soiree for Bad

“DEATH, it takes everything from you… Nobody is ever prepared to face the passing of a loved one, but death is only an event that everyone attends, the rest of the journey is yours, to walk alone…”

This is true for all of us who knew Badrul Redzuan Abu Hassan from the Centre for Research in Media and Communication (Mention), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, and especially for his family. Bad passed away on 8 March 2023.

Bad was my research partner for more than a decade and a great confidante. If you google his name, you will often find my name together as collaborators in research. At the beginning of our research endeavors, we struggled with the research and the writing, at least I did. Being a linguist Bad had a knack for both languages, English and Malay. He often wrote in flowery language while being an ex-journalist, my style was pretty straight forward. This combination got us publish on a few occasions.

Bad was always humble with our achievements, often saying that we were ‘lucky’. I admonished him and said after our third Scopus publication that, “We’re not just lucky, we’re damn good” and we would savour our little victories over a cup of coffee. The sheer amount of writing we did, also got me my associate professorship a few years later. After I informed my family of the good news, I ‘kidnapped’ Bad from his office for us to celebrate over lunch. I couldn’t have done it without him.

We went on to do many projects together, one was a special project for UKM in 2014 where I was coaching him to do a voiceover for a video. One distinct thing about Bad was he had a good voice. I told him I always get distracted with deep sexy male voices no matter what the language. He was one of two people in that category. When he found out who was number one on my list, he said with a chuckle, “Then I’m very happy to be included in your list.”

I’ve always prided myself with having good first impressions of people but with Bad it was different. We were introduced by my PhD supervisor Professor Dr Faridah Ibrahim in 2010. Prof Dah was the chair for the SEBUMI Conference, a cooperation conference between the Communication Department and Fakultas Ilmu Sosial dan Ilmu Politik, Universitas Indonesia. She asked if I could emcee the conference dinner as she knew of my background as a broadcaster.

At the one of the meetings I attended, Prof Dah introduced me to her committee as her student and emcee for the dinner. I was sitting of her left at the head of the table, while Bad sat on her right opposite me. He moved in closer to her and asked, “Boleh ke ni???”. I went on the defensive and said, “You know I can hear you right? I’m sitting right here” and made a face at him. Of course, Prof Dah said, “Boleh. She’s good, you’ll see”. Bad then gave me his boyish grin and I thought to myself, I could work with that smile.

And work together we did, for grants, research publication and book chapters, locally and internationally. My colleagues often asked me about our work together and sometimes commented on how good looking Bad was. I would just laugh and say, “It helps to have a handsome research partner, it distracts from the stress”. But what they didn’t know was that Bad and I had a pact, that we would lean on each other for our research to fulfill our KPIs when one of us couldn’t. He did it for me after my surgery and chemotherapy. I did it for him after his mom and sister passed away.

When I asked him why he never told me about the passing of his family members which happened in a span of three months, this is what he said, “You were going through so much already Lina with the surgery and chemo, I didn’t want to burden you with my problems”. I was like, “But Bad…” I couldn’t finish and broke down. That was Bad, always thinking of others before himself.

Anyone would have been lucky to be on Bad’s friends list. I know I was. But I never imagine I would be praying at his funeral. Kak Jee said that it’s “Rezeki Ina, rezeki Bad... rezeki sebuah persahabatan that Allah SWT has pre-ordained”. I had a few of Bad’s students crying on my shoulder at the mosque, some I didn’t even know. When they we were a bit composed later, I asked them how they know me and I was surprised when they said, Mr Bad often spoke of the research you did. I was humbled.

A week after his demise, I was tasked with finishing our papers. One was for the SEARCH Journal Special Issue. This was for the conference last November 2022, the last time I saw him online when he presented our research, which won us best paper for the conference. The other was for the Journal of Communication for Mention. These were the hardest papers for me to complete. I kept seeing his name everywhere.

When we used to write together, I would send him a SOS or a smoke signal whenever I got stuck. He was quick to answer with “Wassup Doc?” As I was attempting to finish the papers, I felt that he would text me at any time and ask me how the writing was progressing. He did say that with these two papers published, he would have fulfilled his KPI for the year. I told him, “Then you can sit pretty till the end of the year”. But now, fulfilling the KPIs seem absurd but I did complete the papers for him.

I’m still gutted to the core by his passing. My only consolation is that Allah SWT loved him more than all of us put together and that he is no longer in pain. Rest well Bad. Goodbye buddy. Al-Fathehah.

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* Associate Professor Dr Roslina Abdul Latif is the Co-Editor of SEARCH, Journal of Media and Communication Research, School of Media and Communication, Taylor’s University Lakeside Campus.

** The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the position of Astro AWANI.