I Met Max!

by Crazy Ivan


I've said before and I'll say again that the single greatest aspect of the job of Myachi Master is the Maniacs that you meet along the way.  If I wrote out a list of all the cool people I've met over the years that I've done this job, the internet would run out of room.

But once in a while there's a meeting that's so epic I have to blog about it.

Myachi Max is a regular on the Myachi Blog, he's a favorite for Myachi videos, he's a loyal reader of this blog, he's a frequent contestant in our Myachi contests and he's an overall very cool guy.  Unfortunately, he's separated from the bulk of the Myachi movement by something called the Atlantic Ocean (and something else called France).  Max is Myachi's first ambassador to Switzerland and he's been spreading the word for us over there for over a year.

Not to be overly precise, but he's been spreading the word for exactly one day over a year.  He informed me today that yesterday was his one year anniversary with Myachi.  If you had to judge it only by his skills, you would guess that he'd been playing for three or four years, but we'll get to that.

I opened up FAO today so I was there mad early.  Most of the people there today seemed to be from Holland, so half of the time I found myself teaching people who didn't speak much English.  That doesn't really matter, as I long ago learned to teach Myachi without relying on things like language.  At one point, I was teaching two different groups, one speaking Spanish and the other speaking a language I couldn't actually identify.  As I'm walking them through the basics I see this smiling face appear at the edges of the circle.

I've never met Max before, but I recognized him right away from his Facebook photos and his Myachi videos.  I tossed him a Hounds Tooth and he started working it like he was using the Force.  The whole crowd (about 12 or 13 people altogether) went crazy.  He was weaving together dozens of tricks in an effortless and endless symphony of skills.  All the while he's wearing this infectious smile that has everybody around grinning from ear to ear.

So after a few minutes things cleared out a bit and me and Max got to meet formally.  We swap a few tricks and challenges.  I knew he was coming so I brought a few tradables.  I usually sacrifice rareness for yumminess and this trade was no exception as I let a few gems from my collection go for a few of his more yummified semi-commons.  We hung out and jammed for a while and his multi-lingual capabilities came in pretty handy in the international crowd.

He'd been in the day before as well and met Lucky and Bamboo, both of whom he beat in games of MYACH.  He stuck around long enough to meet Bones as well, and while it was too busy for MYACH at the time, he actually made it back in later in the day so that he could notch one more Myachi Master in his belt, beating Bones as well.  He and I never got a chance to play and after seeing his skills, I regret missing out on the challenge.  The dude has sick foot skills, great flexibility, a lot of technical upper body stuff, virtually everything that's ever been featured on Trick of the Day and the best Matrix Unleashed I've ever seen that wasn't performed by Animal.

I believe that Max has said the new record for the longest distance ever traveled to play a game of MYACH at something like 3800 miles (or 6200 km).  Granted, I'm sure his family had some other things to do in New York other than play Myachi, but they've been to FAO two days in a row and they're heading to HQ tomorrow to meet Pinky, Monk and Kid Myach.

All I can say in closing is that I hope Max has had as much fun meeting us as we've had meeting him.