The Night We Went to Karaoke

I went to dinner for siblings R and C’s birthday the other night. They call me Tita, which is largely an honorific address to me rather than an indication of actual blood ties with them.

At dinner, I was sandwiched between birthday girl R and the son of a friend who no longer considers me a friend and I’m fine with not being friends. I heard R say something about starting a book club and reading “1984.” I wanted to join in the conversation but we were seated at a long table and the person across from me said she’s reading “Crying on H Mart”, which is so not 1984, and someone else mentioned “Outliers”, and I said I’ve read that, and confused Malcolm Gladwell with another writer who I knew at first only wrote fiction. I only now recalled who this writer was*, I kept googling “ ‘2000’s writer who wrote about 9/11 incredibly loud” and there was no wi-fi in the restaurant and besides, the son of my friend who no longer considers me a friend couldn’t stop complaining about his mother. So I had to alternately listen and commiserate with him, while wracking my brain trying to remember the writer, and when the menu was presented, wait!, should I be encouraging this son’s diatribes and my clamorous brain while choosing whether I should get filet mignon, share a porterhouse or rib eye, or go seafood at a steakhouse? That’s not right. At least I was able to say “sparkling” swiftly when asked what kind of water we wanted for the table. 

I didn’t eat bread, and there was plenty left. Too bad. Maybe that was better for me. I read that gluten can cause inflammation. Everything seems inflamed and causes spark ignition in me lately. My father was a mechanic and he used to specialize in compression ignition engines. I made a note to look up the difference between the two. How dumb of me - I should have asked my father about this when he was still alive, now I’m old and none the wiser. 

When we stood up to leave after dinner, I made up my mind to join most of the group for karaoke. I took only a few minutes to decide: the other guests were mostly only half my age, so what? The truth was, it was too early at 10pm to go home to an empty apartment, and if I’m lucky, someone else might be able to outdo me in being “desentonado” (off key). I had a vision of myself singing, my left hand pressed to my stomach, drawing out repressed emotions which I will hashtag #hugot (deep within) on Instagram. Filipinos love to sing and dance, and I’m not one of those who can do either. But I’ve been a frustrated singer for a long time, someone who told my daughter when she was little that I met her father when I was a torch singer at a bar. 

L went to H Mart to buy soju and chips. I asked for a Coke, regular please, so it made me appear cooler and set far apart from Elon Musk, who Pim shared a tweet about Musk drinking caffeine-free Diet Coke. 

The karaoke bar in K-Town required IDs, and I thought, just look at my face, isn’t that enough? Then the security guy said, “here you go, young lady”, we both laughed and I mumbled “ I told you.” There was a sign in front “10% discount if cash”, and an ATM machine was standing ready on one corner. 

I scored 97 when I sang She’s Not There, but no one was there to listen and marvel at my achievement, only C. I thought about topping that score, though it seemed shameless to ask for a repeat just as everyone was filing in. Next I sang Hungry Like a Wolf, and L sang with me. 

Sometimes people don’t admit to the song requests they put on queue. Just a small thing I noticed. Like: everything was going well with the selections when Gotta Believe in Magic played, and everyone thought it was requested by the son of the friend who no longer considers me a friend. He teases and heckles when others sing a difficult tune and yells: “panindigan mo ‘yan!” (stand up to it and own it!) when the tune gets harder and out of reach. I would just have said: bring out the stepladder so you can reach it, like my father used to say. 

R and I sang Bohemian Rhapsody and I swore I’d ask for a repeat. Instead, I kept quiet and somehow New York, New York was played several times. 

Other friends of R and C arrived, and I met their friend whose nickname is the back to back C logo after the bags she carried. She was only 18 when I first met her, I told her boyfriend who arrived after his shift at this upscale restaurant named after the poshest borough in NYC but without an N. 

C looked like he was ready for a long deep sleep. A guy on a sweatshirt with Manila75 heat-pressed on it crossed the room and introduced himself to me - I’m here with so and so, I just wanted to say “hi, po, you might think I’m “bastos” (disrespectful) for not acknowledging you.” Acknowledging me, for what, I thought, because I look like I don’t belong here or was he saying this because he’s tipsy? I smiled instead and said oh hi, nice to meet you. 

R and C’s friends of friends came after their restaurant shifts, people in their early ‘20’s, and you can feel the vibes changed quickly. R said: look at how much energy they have, we’re no match for these kids. 

Now everyone was lively, maybe from the soju, maybe from the new bouncy mood from the younger guests. The friend with a nickname for the fashion brand with a back to back C logo put up her hair and wove her way to the front to sing and dance to Material Girl. Someone said to her: that’s you! The woman who came late with her date and was wearing white shimmering beaded pants stood up and danced with abandon after being fueled by a bag of Cheetos. She was nice and sat near me, but when she stood up and hogged the space in front of me I momentarily thought of stepping on her foot, I don’t know, sometimes I get a mean streak for a small reason like when I have a difficult time reading and singing what’s on the screen because someone is right in front of it. I suppressed that thought, though, because it’s not nice, and R is friends with her. 

There were back to back songs with titles of females’ names: Sweet Caroline, Sherry, and each time I think, do I have a past grudge on women named Caroline or Sherry? No? Ok, I’ll sing. 

Everyone stood up for Dancing Queen, none of them 17, but some close enough that age they hoped they can pass for one. Anyway, I thought, 17 can be substituted for 70, or any three-syllable age. I sang with them, the irony not lost on me. R whispered to me: Tita, next ‘na’ Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, and I said, ok, kaya ko ‘yan (I can do that). Bruno Mars sang Versace on the Floor, and I felt just a little annoyed at the preposterousness of the lyrics: why even take off the Versace, seems so predictable and crass. Bruno, a woman fully dressed in a Versace going all the way would be more romantic, I wanted to say. And throw in some donuts, too. I can no longer think of Versace without thinking of donuts. 

I sang Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, but there was no longer any verve and interest. Most everybody was on the floor, and I wanted to sing it alone, perhaps with just one other girl to sing along with me. Instead, everyone sang like it was their song, when it really was my anthem.  I passed my mic for the others to sing. 

When My Way came up, I half expected guns or “balisong” ( butterfly knives) drawn out. ** When it didn’t happen, I thought: this song is so “baduy” (lame) anyway, perhaps redeemable only when it’s played at a funeral. Don’t be angry at me for saying this.

Everyone sang Journey’s Don’t Stop Believing. My question is: who was born and raised in South Detroit, anyone here? But I liked Through the Fire, and I think I can sing it solo, I’d take it all the way, right down to the wire. 

When it was time to leave, I looked at the white grocery bag sitting on the couch beside me. It contained “pasalubong”(welcome souvenir gift) from the Philippines from C. I mentally shook my head. Bad timing: though I was the one who requested the things inside, I so wanted to disown the bag, oh, it cramps my style! It contained an already opened and half-eaten box of Dice hopia (yellow bean pastry) and dried espada (a kind of thin long fish). 

Six of us piled into an Uber XL and L asked about my Substack page, and I told everyone I was writing about the karaoke night and Mel said: Tita, my name po is Melissa, don’t forget.

Hi, Melissa.  

* Jonathan Safran Foer wrote  Everything Is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, among others.

** From Wikipedia: Since January 16, 1998, about a dozen incidents occurred in connection with strenuous complaints over the singing of the song "My Way", prompting Filipino newspapers to name the phenomenon the "'My Way' killings". Attention to these killings peaked on May 29, 2007, when a 29-year-old karaoke singer was shot dead by a security guard at a bar in San Mateo, Rizal.The guard had complained that the young man's rendition of "My Way" was off-key, but the man refused to stop singing, prompting the guard to pull out a .38-caliber pistol and shoot the man dead.