Posts Tagged karaoke
January 2, 2006 part 1 – Karaoke without beer!?
Posted by Barniferous in Karaoke, Life in Japan, The Penpal on January 2, 2016
Today I spent some time hanging out with The Penpal and some of her friends from NICE (Numazu Association for International Communications and Exchanges). We went to karaoke together in the afternoon which was memorable for two reasons: there was no drinking, and I learned how challenging it could be in Japan for someone in a wheelchair. Since these are two very different themes, I am going to make them into separate posts.
Karaoke without beer
I have lost track of how many times I have been to karaoke since coming to Japan almost two and a half years ago. Karaoke in Japan is great – there are private rooms to sing with your friends, there is a phone on the wall to order food and drinks, and alcohol is usually cheap and plentiful. I rarely touch a microphone without having at least one or two drinks. Most of the time I go to karaoke with other English teachers at the end of a late shift. Today I was out with The Penpal’s friends in the afternoon, and nobody was ordering drinks.
Don’t get me wrong – it is both possible to do karaoke without alcohol, and possible to have fun. However, when you sing sober, you become aware of how terrible your singing actually is. I am not a great singer, but this never usually stops me. Today however, I avoided a lot of my regular songs with notes that are outside of my one octave range. I also was a lot less theatrical; no dancing around or striking rockstar style microphone poses. In addition, I did not pick up the spare microphone to duet on songs that I didn’t really know well.
Overall, it was a very different experience than usual, but I still had fun and got to spend some time with The Penpal and her friends. After singing we all went out for yakiniku, which is a great way to end any day.
December 30, 2005 – A night out in Noborito
Posted by Barniferous in Drinking, Friends and coworkers, Hello House on December 29, 2015
I hadn’t been back to Noborito for a while, and was looking forward to catching up with Okonomi and the rest of the Hello House people who were still around. Okonomi had recently moved to an apartment near Shin-Yurigaoka station, and had promised me a place to crash for the night. I packed up my Canada flag backpack and was on my way.
Okonomi and I met at Shin-Yuri station, where I stashed my bag in a coin locker. I have become a huge fan of station lockers in my time in Japan. It was great not to have to carry my stuff around for the evening. After that, we took the Odakyu line to Noborito, paid a quick visit to Hello House, and then went for dinner. Naturally we had Okonomiyaki and a few beers.
(Author’s note: If you are going to Japan, eat Okonomiyaki – it’s amazing)
While living in the area Okonomi had made some Japanese friends in the neighbourhood, including the owners of an “antique shop and bar”. I had walked by this interesting combination of businesses regularly, but had never thought to go in. The two of us hung out for a bit and had a few drinks with the owner and his wife. Our next stop was a small bar with karaoke. After a few drinks we were surprised to see the owners of the antique shop come in after closing for the evening. We took this as a sign that we were going to be best friends, and proceeded to karaoke our lungs out.
I had been out for beer and karaoke many, MANY times during the year I lived in Kawasaki. Like most English teachers, I had stayed to the safe, welcoming environments of the big chain izakayas and karaoke rooms. The Noborito area is full of small character bars which I had walked by many times, but I had never thought to try any of them. Okonomi was one of those intrepid explorers who decided to jump into life in Japan with both feet, and had done her best to improve her language and hang out with locals instead of exclusively with teachers.
We left karaoke sometime around 3:00am and started looking for our next venue. I followed along to about 3 different bars that I had never heard of before, but due to the busy pre-new year season, everything was still full. At this point, Okonomi asked me if I had ever been to a hostess bar before. That’s when the evening took an interesting turn.
(continued)
December 24, 2005 – Christmas songs at the izakaya
Posted by Barniferous in Drinking, Friends and coworkers, Life in Japan, Uncategorized on December 24, 2015
Everyone finished work early because it was Christmas Eve, so we all went out to the izakaya across the street from NOVA to celebrate. Despite being located directly across from the NOVA branch, teachers rarely went to this particular izakaya, opting instead for the cheaper options. English teachers are notoriously frugal with their beer money.
We all had lots of food and possibly a few too many drinks, prompting a very boisterous round of Christmas songs as we approached midnight. We got so loud that the staff asked us nicely to keep the volume down. We took this as a cue to move to karaoke.
Being away from home for Christmas is hard. Being around a bunch of other people who are trying to forget they are also away from home for Christmas does make things easier.
Merry Christmas from Japan!
December 8, 2005 – NOVA Christmas party
Posted by Barniferous in Friends and coworkers, Life in Japan on December 8, 2015
Tonight was the Numazu Nova Christmas staff party!
Over the past few months there have been a lot of parties involving some combination of teachers, staff, or students. In almost every single one there has been some argument, complaint about work, complaint about other coworkers, or someone overindulging. Tonight was different – everyone went out and had a great time. It was one of the most fun and most positive outings in a long time.
Like every other party, we started out in an izakaya and ended up at karaoke. People left through the evening, but I am proud to say that I closed out the evening singing Christmas songs (poorly) with Vivian.
A great time was had by all!
October 10, 2005 – Part of a group
Posted by Barniferous in Drinking, Karaoke on October 10, 2015
Today a group of people went out for beer and karaoke. I was one of them.
(2015 Update) At some point in the future, I will be asked to sum up my 3 years in Japan. If I only use the words “beer and karaoke”, I will have successfully described about 50% of my time in the country.
September 25, 2005 – The world’s funniest burger
Posted by Barniferous in Drinking, Friends and coworkers on September 25, 2015
Another week, another farewell party. One of the teachers from Fuji school requested a transfer to a branch near Kyoto. As with other teacher farewells, we got a gang of teachers and students and went out in Fuji for some (many) drinks and some (lots) or karaoke. The party got particularly lively.
I learned that drunk people should really not attempt to use the karaoke machine remote. It’s very easy to type in the wrong number, and the “cancel song” button looks very similar to the “backspace” button. Canceling a song that someone is singing is bad form!
I also learned that the average karaoke room table is not a good place to stand, especially when it is covered in spilled beer. Fortunately nobody was hurt during the sudden fall to the floor, although some additional beer got spilled.
Another observation was that karaoke places do not have enough bathrooms when you really need one. Some of the teachers decided to take out their frustration by throwing around toilet paper rolls that were awkwardly stored outside the very slow bathroom. This is fun, but not a great way to behave in public.
Discussing politics while drunk is NEVER a good idea. It’s an especially bad idea with a group of people from different countries where words like “conservative” and “socialist” have different meanings. Fortunately karaoke was very loud, and it helped cover up the pointless political debate.
After cleaning up as much of our mess as possible, the teachers ended up at the nearby convenience store to get some snacks for the train ride home. I found a selection of heat and serve burgers in the baked goods section of the convenience store, which for some reason I found hilarious. When I say hilarious, I mean I literally felt that this burger, in a wrapper that said “burger” in both English and Japanese, was the funniest thing I had ever seen. I couldn’t stop laughing.
As funny as I found the burger, my brain was still sober enough to realize that it probably wouldn’t be very good. After making an impassioned 5 minute sales pitch, I finally did convince another teacher to buy the burger. I expected it to be terrible, which would have been funny (for me). He told me it was one of the best burgers that he had ever eaten, and wouldn’t offer a bite so I could taste it. This turned out to be funny for him.
Like a previous trip to Fuji, we ended up taking the late train home. There are going to be a lot of sore people in the morning.
(2015 Update) I still don’t know why I found that burger to be so funny, and I never worked up the courage to eat an convenience store reheatable burger.
June 26, 2005 – Birthday karaoke (not mine)
Posted by Barniferous in Azeroth, Karaoke on June 26, 2015
Tonight I went out for birthday karaoke (not mine) with Azeroth and some of his friends, most of whom are students. I didn’t think there was such a think as too much karaoke, but by the end my voice gave out and all I could do was squeak into the microphone.
May 14, 2005 – Too much karaoke?
Posted by Barniferous in Karaoke on May 14, 2015
Something strange happened today; something that has never happened in my 19 months in Japan so far. Something I didn’t even think was possible.
I think I did too much karaoke tonight after work.
Drinking in Japan 
Recent Comments