KTV

With the approaching Labour Day holiday, my training center wanted to do something to celebrate and forget about some of the drama that has been going on. And there has been a lot of drama – the holiday schedule, foreigners leaving, teachers doing new or annoying things.

So, for our distraction and some team bonding, they decided that we’re going to do KTV.

For those of you that don’t know, KTV is karaoke. But, instead of being in a bar with a bunch of strangers, most of whom can’t sing, you get a private room to share with your friends. These type of karaoke places are very popular in certain countries.

There are a few places like this in the US. I once accidentally wound up in one in Los Angeles when I lived there. It was small and the rooms weren’t that big, from what I remember. We left fairly quickly to head to a different bar.

The one we went to wasn’t that far from the training center. It was only about 3 metro stops away. And it was seriously fancy!

But, before we can meet up with our coworkers, a couple of foreigners and I left work in search of some food. We didn’t want to drink on empty stomachs. We debated going to a restaurant, which would take a while, getting fast food, which can also be slow, or getting a snack from a mini mart.

But first, they found some alcohol and China doesn’t have the public drinking laws that the US does. So while we were deciding on food, we drank. We eventually found some chips we liked and took a taxi to the KTV.

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Once out of the taxi, we had to find the place. It didn’t help that the taxi let us out on a side street past the KTV as the location pin, the thing you use to find places or people in China, was wrong. It was close to where we needed to go, but it was off a bit.

Luckily, we had someone that had been there once before, long ago. She had a vague idea of where to go, and what she did remember was able to get us where we were going without having to ask for directions. It didn’t hurt that there were very large signs that said KTV that we could follow.

Getting in the building was almost as hard as getting there. The security guard had us show our QR codes, do a temperature scan, and one of us had to sign the log. Most of it was fine.

However, signing the log gave us a few problems. We understood where the phone number when and could figure out that we had to add the temperature. But the last thing was confusing. We assumed it was name, but the guard kept saying no.

Eventually, he was given my friend’s phone so he could write what we had do and it would translate for us. After a character or 2, the phone said it was last name, not full name (名字, ming zi).

Apparently, it was a very significant and important difference and caused us to be delayed long enough for people to start wondering where we are. They were about to send out a search party, or, just some Chinese speaking assistance.

Finally in the building, we went to a reception desk, because apparently, if you and your friends get a room to yourselves, you need to be told which room to go to and pay for it.

As most of our group was already there and told us which room to go to, we just made a brief pass by the lady behind the desk to let her know that we already had a room to go to. After a lot of stairs, we were joined by a gentleman who showed us which room was ours.

The whole of the upstairs there was just a bunch of soundproofed rooms for people to go into and sing their hearts out. I heard no music in the halls. It was quite impressive. The hallway, along with the rest of the building is very nice, but a little boring, as it’s not the main focus of the business. People don’t go there to hang out in the lobby or a hallway. They go to get a room and sing and drink.

Our room was insanely fancy. We had a chandelier and a pool table!

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In addition to singing, drinking (small Heinekens, water, and something else probably alcoholic), and playing pool, we also had lots of sets of dice. They had both English and Chinese songs available to sing. If you sang in Chinese, you could get feedback and graded, like in Rock Band or Guitar Hero.

I don’t sing. I’m tone deaf. I did spend a lot of time drinking the tiny Heineken, learning to play a dice game, and chatting. I had to leave early to catch the last metro. Everyone else left around 3 am.

Great start to a holiday I wasn’t looking forward to (too much work next week).

If you have any questions about any of the terms I’ve used, look in the glossary.