A Lost in Translation moment

It was more like four hours actually. No, it did not involve a wig, drunk Japanese people and Bill Murray- and I will not be judged here- but I just had the most awesome time at a karaoke spot tonight. Absolutely awesome! It had to be four of the most outrageously cathartic and abandoningly un-self-conscious hours I will be spending in a while and I love my two best-est, best-est friends for setting it up- I don't think I would have done it with anyone else!! (unless you are deaf, dumb AND blind. Really.)

Several rules apply when you want to even consider stepping into one of these establishments in Singapore:
1) Cast off any pre-conceived notions of who you believe to be the clientele. While there will be your fair number of sleazy businessmen whose idea of recreation involves hot tea, hot towels and not-so-subtle amounts of groping, there are families and friends who are actually there for the singing.
2) You cannot- I repeat, CANNOT- sing karaoke with anyone else except with the people closest and dearest to you. Only they can hear you sing and still love you after. Thank you Ann and Aileen for still hugging me at the end of the night.
3) Leave all semblance of dignity and self-respect at the door. If you really want to enjoy yourself at a karaoke joint, forget any pretense of sophistication. It is neither the time nor place. Do not attempt to sing Coldplay or anything even remotely cool. A few of the "best" tracks we sang tonight were ones we would never admit to liking in civilized company. Think Westlife(!), N'Sync(!!) and Justin Timberlake(!!!).
4) Related to the previous rule, the only songs appropriate for karaoke are songs by boy-bands (because they involve no effort in terms of tone or pitch), Chinese songs (because we seldom hear them and don't know how badly we're mangling the lyrics... Oh, and I discovered that the world of Jay Chou, Sandy Lam and Emil Chow is a beautiful one...) and anything before 1980 (because... well, they just are. Think Barry Manilow, The Carpenters and Neil Sedaka.). There are the guiltly pleasure indulgence exceptions of course: bands/ singers from our teenage years are acceptable (and only if we don't tell anyone we didn't need to look at the lyrics to sing their songs)- Wilson Phillips, Debbie Gibson, Indecent Obsession (I highly doubt that three almost-thirty women breaking out into a rousing rendition of "Fixing a Broken Heart" is the ultimate portrait of poise and dignity).
5) Thou shall not sing U2 at a karaoke joint. An attempt to belt out "With or Without You" was met with the sad realization that women should just stick to lusting after Bono, not try to imitate him...
6) Rap *does not* work. Let's see you do Black Eyed Peas' "Where Is the Love" without missing a word...
7) You have to ignore the sometimes incongruous and often downright ludicrous videos that accompany the songs. Some honorable mentions: the video of Extreme's ballad, "More Than Words" was set in an all-girl head-banging rock concert; Faith Hill's "This Kiss" had a woman in a gaudy swimsuit and tasteless earrings wading very very slowly alone in the waters of Phi Phi island; and this has got to take the cake: Mr. Barry "my-teeth-are-definitely-bleached-white" Manilow's "Copacabana" (which was ignobly spelled "Cupacabana") was played to scenes of retirees driving vintage cars at a car show. I do not kid.

It was really great fun. Oh, and you also uncover the most sublime things about the people you love while you're at it. Like the fact that someone does an awesome cover of J.Lo's "Jenny On The Block" (ok fine, we all did...) and that nothing brings a smile to a certain somebody's face than a certain lead singer from a certain boy-band...

Pay me and I'll keep quiet.