Sunday- Shopping and Karaoke Madness part 2

It is currently Tuesday at about 8am here. Now to finish the tale of Sunday.

We finished at the izakaya and split the bill evenly. Then our sempai (seniors) invited us to karaoke, a favorite of the Japanese. We headed downstairs to find that it was indeed raining. And me without my umbrella. Actually, none of us had one. In any case, some went home, but Jess, Barb, Jill, Ashley, Jeff, Bryce, Jason, the two Matts, and I stayed. At first, though, Jeff and Bryce wandered off to buy booze. -_-;;;

None of us, even the seniors, had ever been to this particular karaoke bar before, so upon checking out prices, one of our sempai decided to get a member card to reduce the cost. Let me give you the breakdown here. In karaoke, a group of people essentially rent out a small room for a period of time to sing their favorite songs. The price is determined by how many people there are and how long each person stays. Anyone who leaves before the rest of the group generally leaves their portion of the bill with whoever is left. The increment of measure is a half hour.

We initially decided to stay for one hour. I went first, singing Again by Yui. Everyone who didn't know me was pretty surprised, teehee. A half hour into our stay, Jeff and Bryce joined us. They seemed to enjoy selecting the American songs available, heh. Speaking of which, there were a ton. I must say, the Japanese love our language and our music. Once the initial hour was up, one Matt left as he was tired and feeling a little under the weather. The rest of us decided to stay another half hour. I sang some more too. ^-^

Okay, so at this point there were 9 of us left. After that hour and a half, 7 of us decided to leave. It was really only an hour for Jeff and Bryce though. So we used the phone in the room to tell the front desk how many were leaving, and we took the elevator down. Upon arriving at the front desk, though, it turned out that Jess had brought down the money collected by the 5 girls as our portion. Jeff and Bryce also brought their money with them, so we asked the gentlemen at the desk if we could pay separately. And so, hell began.

When we had entered, we were told the cost would be 400yen per person for each half hour. As such, the 5 girls who stayed 1.5hrs should have each payed 1200yen, and the boys who only stayed 1hr should have each payed 800yen. However the people behind the counter were convinced that each person owed 1625yen. We weren't sure if they were charging us all full price for 1.5hrs, or just charging us for 2hrs, or how they even got that number. Bryce, who was best at speaking in Japanese tried to explain to the man that they were charging us too much. However, Bryce was drunk, and the whole situation became so confusing. They were typing numbers on a calculator to try to justify the price, but they also kept changing it on us.

At that point, a rather drunk Japanese businessman came out of one of the rooms to ask for something at the front desk. He chatted me up a bit, asking if singing in Japanese was okay for me, until he noticed our struggle. He took it upon himself to try to help us, because that's the kind of hospitality you find in Japan. He was very kind, but also drunk, and the conversation between him, Bryce, and the clerk seemed to go on and on. He and Bryce became fast friends, as drunks tend to, but the clerk would not budge. The second clerk was even brought into the exchange. Eventually we said screw it, and paid the 1625yen each, but Bryce continued to argue about it in his drunken stupor. And again the Japanese gentleman, "Shuu-chan", as he told Bryce to call him, tried to help.

We still hadn't sorted things out by the time Matt and Jason came down to pay, meaning it had been a half hour of straight arguing. Unfortunately, Matt and Jason were drunk as well, Jason being the worst. He could barely stand on his own. It appeared Shuu-chan paid the rest, perhaps Matt and Jason's portion? I'm not even sure, but Bryce thanked him, and they both kept bowing lower and lower to each other. Then Bryce explained to us that Shuu-chan wanted us to come sing a song for his group, a condition we had not consented. Either way, Jason was sent home with Ashly, Jill, and Barb. That left Matt, Jeff, Bryce, Jess, and I to deal with the song. I took charge and said I would just sing Again by Yui once more to settle the matter.

And so, the five of us left squeezed into the room with Shuu-chan and his 9 or so colleagues. I took the small selection device and requested my song, asking for a microphone from one of the drunks. My back to the screen of lyrics, I sang to the crowd. It was clear they were surprised that an American could sing in Japanese, and they cheered and clapped along. -_-;;; Once the song finished, we excused ourselves, but getting Bryce back was difficult. As we left the building, Shuu-chan's group came too, and I was attacked by questions like "Where are you from?", "Do you speak Japanese?", and "How long have you been here?". They were amazed we'd only been in Japan a few days. Everyone kept shaking my hand; it was kind of baffling, really. Shuu-chan was kissing everyone's hands. Three times for me. Jeez. Then he felt the need to ask Matt and Bryce if either was my boyfriend, but we all insisted otherwise. He didn't believe us. Sigh.

We finally explained that we had to get home, and all but dragged Bryce away. The way home was also "fun". It was still raining, and the station we walked through to get to dinner and karaoke was closed, as it was 12:30am. We found the nearest koban (police box), and asked for directions back to our dorm. We thanked them and went on our way. The walk was long and exhausting. At some point, a young man we passed advised us to get a taxi- he must've felt sorry for us not having umbrellas and looking like drowned rats. But we were almost there at that point and told him not to worry. It was after 1am that we returned to our rooms. It took all the energy I had just to get the wet clothes off of me and put some kind of pajamas on. I flopped onto my bed and passed out immediately.

Soooo... we decided not to go to that karaoke bar ever again. And since then, our seniors have explained that that has never happened to them. They also apologized for allowing something like that to happen, but it really wasn't their fault. It was an experience, good or bad, and I now find it mostly funny. Hope you all do too. ^^;;;