KARAOKE TIME

look, i have an american friend! haha

apparently the peace sign is popular

i finally went out and had a night on the town!! i've been quite the unsocial person, mostly because i'm not sure who to be social with, but last night it was a co-workers birthday, so we all took her out and played! oh man. all i can say is KARAOKE. the chinese pretty much worship karaoke. and it's not necessarily a party, fun thing either, it's taken serious! so this is how it all went down...i wait FORTY (yes 40) minutes for a cab, finally get downtown to meet up with everyone. half go to eat, half go to get our room for karaoke. i went with the karaoke half. it was crazy-busy. this place looks like a club with a ton of private rooms. it was way way nice and new and modern-looking, too. we get our room right away cuz someone was smart and made reservations. it has a small, mini bar, a big, L-shaped leather couch with some tables, a couple other chairs, and a big screen. there's a little monitor thing where you pick your playlist, basically, and all the songs just start playing. there were 3 microphones. i mean this room had everything. sound effects, lighting effects, the works. PLUS they have servers and you can order any food or drink you want. it was awesome! haha i couldn't believe it. maybe some of you already knew about this or have seen this before, so it's old news for you, but i had no idea! the big difference i think between american karaoke and chinese karaoke is the chinese really take it seriously and sing the best they can and it's almost totally quiet except for the person singing. lots of slow songs. some were very typical chinese opera style songs. so thank GOODNESS we had more of our white peeps come and show em how it's done. it was awesome. like a private dance party. you can be as loud as you want. it was crazy. we had the room til midnight, and most everyone stayed that late, too. don't you worry, i was definitely a partaker of the karaoke madness...