My first time

All my life, I’ve avoided a certain activity, something lots of other people do, something lots of other people really enjoy. There’s just always been something about it that makes me uncomfortable, that makes me feel like it’s a very wrong thing to get involved in:

As a person who actively stays away from anything that might bestow any public attention on oneself (when I played drums in the school ‘rock’ band, I requested that I be positioned as far back as possible so no one could see me), doing anything that requires one to get up, hold a microphone, and be seen and heard is equivalent to asking me if I’d like a dose of gonorrhea to go with my Bloody Mary. In other words, I’m kind of shy.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not afraid of singing. I sing all the time. I sing along in pubs and clubs when it’s so loud hardly anyone can hear me, I’ll sing along to my CDs playing at home, I’d even been in the choir back when I had no other ECAs left to join. But to pick up a mike and croon into it? No thank you.

KTV bars in Singapore have also left me with the impression that they are mostly pretty seedy, full of lounge hostesses who, for the right price, will do pretty much anything for you — not that I’ve been to one in Singapore, but baby, the stories I’ve heard! If I ever have to listen to another tale about a KTV hostess giving a blowjob in front of assembled guests it will be too soon.

So it was with great trepidation that I went along to the karaoke this evening just past. It was in celebration of Winki’s birthday, and I felt that it would be kind of poor manners to excuse myself from the evening’s entertainment after a long meal at the Indian restaurant.

(I don’t think Neil shares the same feelings for the same reasons as I about karaoke, but since he only sings when he has surpassed the so-drunk-he-dances phase, he’s not its biggest fan.)

I saved myself (mostly) by being the only person who could read the Chinese characters on the keypad and computer screen, so I literally became the KTV GOD. And it was sort of worth it, because apparently, one line of Kylie’s I Should Be So Lucky is actually:

Dirty, dirty girl. Or dirty, dirty Stock, Aitken, and Waterman.

Yes, I sang along now and again. Yes, I pushed the mike away every time it was proffered. I may have popped my KTV cherry last night, but some things will never change.

(Photos.)