Videoke

(Here is something to read in the meantime while I am still making the entry for my Donsol trip. Apologies for the late late post. I hope you enjoy this for the mean time.)

I love to sing. Let’s admit it, we curse so much at neighbors that sing videoke till the wee hours of the night, but when faced with the machine it will take a crowbar to pry the mic off of you.

Aba, masarap ata kumanta!
There’s nothing like belting out those high notes, never mind if we sound like finger nails being scratched across a blackboard…or worse parang kinukuping na yero (galvanized sheet being twisted)!

There’s a bit of a devil in me whenever I listen to videoke singing from the neighbors. I turn into a song critic and wince at the flat and sharp notes being belted out…”Ummm! Buhay ka pa!”

I remember one time we were at Anilao, Friday night. Danny and the gang were having a drinking session while I was snoozing. I woke up to the singing of videoke. My friend Riezel said, “Tara Maan! Tapatan natin yung mga kumakanta, ang babastos eh gabi na kumakanta pa!” (lets show em! ) After all, it was 10 pm already and there were no signs of the singing flagging down.

So I said alright. Our repertoires consisted of “My Way”, “Welcome to the Jungle”, “Through the Fire” and other songs sung ear splittingly. Danny came down to join us and we cranked up the volume. Not to be outdone, they also turned it up and matched ours!

So there we were puking out our throats, at first we were having fun…till 2 hours later, Riezel and I were just sitting down and trying to finish the song while half asleep. “Di ko na kaya ate maaaannn…”

We decided to call it a night and went inside to catch some sleep.

The neighbors?

Danny said that when he woke up at 3 a.m., they were still singing.

There was this one girl that was dominating the mic that had a grating quality to her voice, thin and tremolous like she was on her last breath. If you can imagine a cockroach singing with a warbling voice, you’ll get what I mean.

We woke up at 6 a.m. and they were still at it. We went to the market, cooked food and had lunch and this girl was STILL singing, “Ang LAKE LAKE! ANG LAKE LAKI NG BOLAKLAK! ANG POLA POLA! ANG POLA POLA!”....on and on and on.

They finished at 2 pm.

In which case we promptly played house music at full volume, making the speakers covering bulge out.

Revenge fell on deaf ears. The adjoining resort was empty…

And I?

I found myself singing, ang lake lake, ang lake lake ng bolaklak….the whole day.