It's hard to put into words what you want to say when someone passes away. It's even harder when you've never met that person, personally.
In our world of sports blogging and message boarding, where anonymity is king and you are whatever persona you and your avatar desire to be, we all create our social circles. Even if we've never met in person, and even if we don't know everyone's true identity, we still come to befriend and/or revere others in cyberspace.
Fatty fat fat, Fatty4KSU, FFF, or just "Fatty" (as he was known all over Big 12 message boards), was possibly the greatest KSU fan on the planet (Yes, he rivaled Robert.), at the very least in the electronic realm. Fatty's real name was Shwan Alkhatib. I had no idea about that until yesterday, when I heard of his passing on goEMAW.com.
Some of you may recognize the name due to his videos, of which, many are nothing short of legendary. You may know the name based on a message board interaction, where he was prolific. He was one of the few posters who transcended normal message boarding and became an icon. There really isn't much to say other than that. If you were a serious poster on any Big 12 message board, you knew Fatty. End of story.
Most of you have probably seen the following video several times. Maybe more. It's still, in my opinion, the greatest video in the history of Kansas State athletics. Period. The Birth of Kansas State Football said everything there needed to be said about where we were, where we went, and what it meant to all of us. I doubt there will ever be another video created that captures everything that we ever wanted or needed to say about the "Greatest Turnaround In the History of College Football", and he did it in ten minutes. Shwan was a genius whose passion was EMAW.
I highly suggest that you watch this video again and click on of the links above to visit goEMAW to learn more about Shwan. Also, if you feel so inclined, please feel free to donate to his memorial fund, which will help fund his elder brother's fight with cancer.
I don't know what else to say. The world is a worse place without fatty. He will be missed dearly by many, many people.
RIP Fatty.