Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Karaoke with His Excellency

I'm now back in the U.S. and starting to catch up on posts. I'll try and post several in the next couple of weeks. Here's the first:

It came about innocently enough. After several breakfasts, a few family lunches and dinners, and an election victory celebration party, His Excellency hinted at his desire to take us to karaoke. Having enjoyed our previous encounters with His Excellency and curious to see what karaoke means to a National Assemblyman, we were eager to accompany him.

Following several failed attempts to set up a mutually agreeable time, we finally managed to pick a Saturday evening that we were free and that worked for His Excellency. In his spotty English, he explained that we should be ready to go at 7:30pm. As we cooked dinner, we called to confirm the time and place. We were instructed to meet in front of the Cambodiana at the agreed upon time, 7:30pm.

At 7:15pm we left the house via tuk-tuk and headed for the Cambodiana. When we arrived, His Excellency's big black Lexus was already idling out front. We hopped out of the tuk-tuk and were greeted by His Excellency, who rolled down the driver window as we approached. As we climbed into the backseat we were introduced to his assistant, sitting shotgun, a round, portly man about the same age as His Excellency. Throughout the night, he didn't say one word to us, in either English or Khmer nor did he sing at all at karaoke.

We drove north along the river and cut west on Russian Boulevard before turning off onto Street 109 where we arrived at a very sketchy karaoke club. The building was several stories high with neon lights - including the telltale red - adorning the outside. A young and attractive hostess (probably also a prostitute) showed us into the elevator and took us to a private karaoke room with a long leather couch, glass tables, and a large television.

We ordered a round of drinks - beer for me and Shanti, tonic and lime for His Excellency and his assistant - as His Excellency started us off with a few songs in Khmer. Unsurprisingly, he was quite a good singer. And although I'd like to think that Shanti and I had a pretty impressive song selection ("Don't Stop Believin'" and "A Whole New World" were among our picks), we couldn't match the singing of His Excellency.

Throughout the evening, His Excellency and his assistant had the "accompaniment" of two much younger Cambodian women. Although they just sang and danced - someone had to make the headbopping and fist-pumping of His Excellency's assistant look better - we had little doubt that they would do far more than that. On the whole it was quite a strange night, but I suppose we should not have expected differently from a Cambodian National Assemblyman.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

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