While we are in Dalat, we are invited to a bar with Rot, one of the owners of the hotel, where he is going to meet his friends for a night out. Rot has turned out to be thoroughly decent chap with an excellent command of English, so we gladly accept. The evening's activities begin in a local hostelry which is more like a large garage with a corrugated iron roof. Here we meet Rot's friends who are a positively welcoming bunch. Two shot glasses are put in front of us and we are poured a drink from one of the many random bottles of yellow liquid doing the rounds at the table. It is revealed that this is home-brewed rice wine. One shot follows another and any empty glass is refilled instantly with what seems to become a catchphrase of “Last one!...Ha ha ha!”
As Rot and his friends become more tipsy, we sit back and soak up the atmosphere. After a couple of hours, we move on to the next stop, one of Dalat's many karaoke bars. Inside, we are assigned our own room complete with comfy settees, coffee tables, and plasma TV. A crate of beer and an elaborate fruit platter is brought in and the ballads commence. One ballad follows another, each singer earnestly singing homesick love ballads in Vietnamese. Theatrical air-grabbing and duets soon ensue and when a female voice is required to play the role of forlorn, spurned Vietnamese love interest in the next ballad, there can be only one candidate in the eyes of our hosts. The microphone is thrust into Anna's hand and moments later the lyrics start piling onto the screen, like items on a assembly line, to the whine of alien music. Without time to think and with all expectant eyes resting on her, she starts improvising to the melody of the onscreen lyrics. More surprising than this impressive feat of ad libbing was that instead of the expected falsetto from Anna, a rich baritone came forth bombinating around the room, making her singing compadre sound like a castrated Joe Pasquale.
We
are invited to select our songs of choice from a weighty book of
numbered offerings. Our choices are noted and passed to an unseen
attendant and we apprehensively wait our turn. The ballads roll on
as the drinks flow liberally, and correspondingly, our Vietnamese
hosts become increasingly sentimental. As the night continues and
none of our song choices appear, we begin to think that we might get
away scot-free. Alas, this is not to be and instead the first notes
of 'Careless Whisper' signal our push into a reluctant performance.
Anna, however, instantly slips into the role of consummate
entertainer; perhaps the heady mix of beer and spoon-fed coconut
flesh helps her transformation into karaoke diva, a cross between
Susan Boyle and Margarita Pracatan. The version of 'Careless Whisper'
soon meanders into unknown territory, however, with an extended two
minutes of 'na na na'. Undeterred, Anna continues in a key of at
least two octaves deeper than the original, much to the amazement of
our hosts, and when the song ends she is met with celebration
normally reserved for George Michael himself.
i just about choked on my mornin pancakes! god work anna!!x x
Posted by: Jessipoos | 07/24/2010 at 10:49 AM