Kung Fu Finger PiercingThrough Coconut

The Kung Fu king who uses his finger to smash coconuts is retiring the digit to enjoy life out of the limelight.May 11th 2008.



In the southwestern city of Melaka, a man stands under a banner that reads MALAYSIA BOLEH! Four coconuts are set out in front of him. This is kung fu master Ho Eng Hui; he pierces coconuts with a finger faster than anyone else in Malaysia.





He addresses the crowd, describing boleh. His voice fills with emotion, and he frequently points to his heart. The spirit of doing the best you can, striving for achievement because you are Malaysian, he says, is the driving force behind his art.

He passes around a coconut for people to inspect. He shows his index finger, cruelly bent from previous coconut penetrations. Ho broke it in 1993, but perservered to win an entry in the Malaysian Book of Records for breaking through 3 coconuts in just over a minute. And then he pauses to pitch a bottle of red-colored oil that supposedly eases pain, stimulates muscles, and saves marriages.




After an impassioned riff on his special elixir, the boleh spirit summons him. He emits several screams and jabs his finger into the shell over and over until it punches through, splattering coconut milk everywhere.

The crowd cheers. An assistant runs to help extricate the mangled digit, and then - in a masterful stroke of product placement - Ho dumps a bottle of his own miracle potion onto his hand and rubs it into the skin. He bends over and groans in a superior display of showbiz and promotional savvy. VIA

Paul Chapman of Reuters reports: Link [Reuters video]

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