Karaoke night

Down this strange cavernous bar hallway with its fake stone walls that trick you into imagining you're in some kind of fantastical grotto, and behind the glass door, a bunch of mostly native English speakers sat on soft couches, drank countless beers and sang Karaoke for hours tonight.

They're all the student-teachers in my class. It did not take too long -- just a few drinks and several packs of dried prawn snacks -- for the group to succumb to the quintessential Asian night out: singing and singing and singing.

This is Ben. He graduated with a degree in peace studies from the University of Bradford. I didn't realize it at first, but he actually does know how to create calm.


That's Marta -- she's Bulgarian, dresses in shiny red and black satin pants, and has shockingly blond hair, which is supposedly a no-no in this culture but no one has ever said anything pointed about it to her. When she first introduced herself to the group, she described herself as "Mysterious Marta."

Doug and Lize, from Ottawa, Canada. They're retired and they're newlyweds -- they married this summer. They're traveling the world together for a few years on the savings Doug piled away as a nuclear engineer. Once during class when we had to use an example of the present continuous, he turned to Lize and said, "I'm looking at a beautiful woman."

Lena and Ben. Lena's the one who found the karaoke bar, which is called Nice, on Nguyen Thi Minh Khai. I think at this point they were singing Strawberry Fields Forever. The Beatles make perfect Karaoke-night songs as all their lyrics seem fitting for evenings like these:

Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields.
Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.
Strawberry Fields forever.

Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see.
It's getting hard to be someone but it all works out.
It doesn't matter much to me.

Always no sometimes I think it's me, but you know I know when it's a dream.
I think, er No, I mean, er Yes but it's all wrong.
That is I think I disagree.

Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields.
Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.
!!