A party!

I WAS a serious clubber – meaning, I used to frequent clubs, night after night, week after week – without fail.

My Monday to Friday schedule would see me waking up at 6.00 am, rushing to work ( with a briefcase that doubled as a suit case for the night ), teaching / conducting lectures, quizzes, tests, exams, and when nights came – I would be seen rushing to our favourite clubs / night spots – all these done without having to go home. ( Note: the briefcase! )

The live bands’ performance would determine our clock-out time. A Somebody-shoot-me status would see us staying only for dinner ( before moving on to the next scene ); So-so would last us for the first set; where else a Happening status would see us through until the club’s closing time. We would be the club’s unofficial managers / promoters / language inspectors cum the band’s set writers as well as song selectors! Coming back at 2 or 3 am didn’t stop us from waking up religiously at 6.00 am, ready to greet a brand new day!

For those who thought that drinking was our past time, you were wrong. We were not ( still aren’t ) even the social drinkers. We drank, all right – Coke, iced-lemon tea, hot chocolate and the likes. We had our close encounter with liquor-laced orange juice compliment from the two Middle East patrons at Wall$t; thankfully, the club captain came to the rescue and took the drinks away! ( And scolded us, at the same time?!!! Strange, we did not even know it was laced with alcohol and we had not taken a sip of the drink, either… )

Had they set up a club for non-drinkers, I could have been the Patron or Chief Executive Officer with all my non-drinker friends as the board of directors. The other strange thing about the whole scenario is that we would be surrounded by friends who consumed alcoholic beverages as if it was mineral water. I once befriended a serious drinker … but the idea of spending my nights waiting for my knight to regain consciousness nearby a smelly drain was kind of appalling! I am no Florence Nightingale. Nevertheless, thanks to him – I got a brilliant idea for my yahoo username ;-)

We were not your typical SPG ( Sarung Party Girls? ) either; in the first place, we were not SPG at all! You wouldn’t see any one of us in little black dresses ( we couldn’t fit into any ), neither would you see us dancing drunkenly on the stools / stage or even on the dance floor! But if you were to ask any of the bands who used to perform in front of two ( minimum ) or more, serious-looking ( sometimes laughing hysterically! ) ladies in office attires, we were the club’s…. quality controllers! Long before IIM earned its ISO9001 certificate, we had been awarding clubs with similar certification. We were ruthless and those ( bands, waiters / waitresses/ bar tenders,/ managers even other patrons ) who did not meet our standard, would find themselves in hot soup!

Essential criteria include:

Bands

• Song selection – Too much Reggaes kill, save this for die-hard Rasta fans; Techno causes death ( even to pigs! ); you’d better entertain all those in-coming song requests especially those written by similar hand writings as failure to do so will result in your contract being terminated in the middle of the month… opps, sorry! U2’s With or Without You is a must… it’s clearly stated in the contract…. Nobody does Village People’s YMCA anymore… ABBA’s Dancing Queen? Once in a purple moon would be alright, BUT please make sure that we’re not around when you do this. We appreciate Cake’s I Will Survive, not Gloria Gainer’s…. Oh yes, Glenn – we love your Faithfully!
• Attires – Please advise your female singer to cover up, we have those under 12 here! As for the guys, leave all those sequin-covered uniforms in your wardrobe! Bright red, bright green, bright orange – puhlees!!!! With all the spotlights, please tone down the colours….
• Hair – Only Alleycats get away with those BIG hair dos. Blonde wigs would only look good if you are … blonde! Wind-blown, messy hair is so …. Messy! We had enough of screaming at our students for having long and unruly hair, so don’t expect us to conduct a similar spot check as well.
• Social skills / communicative abilities – Do mingle around… It would do wonders for your business! We also expect articulate front liners, not one who could only mumble mmm, aaa, iiiii, uuu…. And no more underwear joke, Fredo! ( The last time I visited Holiday Villa.. this was the rage! )
• English proficiency – Do not attempt any English songs unless you are very, very sure of your pronunciation, diction, subject-verb-agreement and the likes!!! Be sure of your partner’s gender before going on stage ( to prevent you from introducing your good-looking male singer’s next song with “ SHE will sing us… ” ) …
• Dance moves – Synchronized dance movement ( YMCA , get it? ) is so yesterday, no one does it anymore! Robbie Williams and Ricky Martin get away with any types of movement, so will you!
• Body language / eye-contact / facial expression – Swallow your smirk if you were to see the same Back at 1 or Koch Koch Hota Hai song requests, and please bear in mind that Put can read lips very well! Don’t bother to check whether you’re wearing the same pair of shoes throughout the night, either… Look at the audience, or at least, pretend!

Clubs

Ambience

• Throw that disco lights out! Save that for The 70s Show!
• Provide better lightings especially with those broken floor tiles … or is that the reason?
• Check out that on-screen advertisements or you’ll end up getting sermons from us …. Oh well, we’ll correct the language for you guys, FOC – only for the first time, Sam!
• Don’t bother separating the smokers from the non-smokers, ultimately, we all end up being secondary smokers (and had a difficult time explaining to our moms / dads / sister-in-laws later…)

Staff

• Please inform that new waitress to mind her manners – we know the so-called accident in which she accidentally pushed in the chair too hard that it hit my friend’s knee was NOT an accident.
• Please improve on your language – we know that it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work here, but surely you can converse better than that!
• Acting high-and-mighty with someone who is even higher-and-mightier might not be a good idea!!!
• Don’t you have anything better to do than chatting up that cute singer every time he is on break? ( And please make sure that you deliver our request straight to him! )
• Those complimentary Diavolla / hot chocolate / coke refills / Tiger bags, t’shirts, pens are truly appreciated… in fact, the idea of being scolded for something that we didn’t do ( the liquor-laced orange juice ) was kind of sweet as well!

Meals

• How could we forget those heavenly Diavolla, spicy spaghetti, seafood chowder, mud pie? And thanks for pointing out the difference between Jack Daniel and Monterey Jack!
• Enough said… no complaints! WE wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for the food…

Patrons

• Please take note that we are very selective – and we do not simply fall for any pick-up lines, and please make sure that you get my name right before making a dedication with the band!
• Please be informed that the main singer could either be our long-lost big brother who would look after us with his eagle-like eyes ( thank you, Suresh! ) or someone that I’m currently dating ( before you attempt #1 )…
• No Bacardi Coke, Virgin Mary, Kampai, Tequila shots, Long-island Tea for us – attempts would only result in you being barred from entering the clubs the next time ( patrons / bands ). Of course, what ever drinks you decide to buy us would be screened by multi-levels screening committee members before they could even reach us…
• Yes, the ‘major babes’ that the song was dedicated to would be us ( though you couldn’t really see us previously )…

Clubbing was fun; nevertheless, just as it took a tragedy for me to opt to clubbing as an escapism, it also took another tragedy to point out that I had enough of the whole thing. However, as so many tend to associate clubbing with social ills, low morale, ignorance of reality; I just wish to point out that spending night after nights in dimly-lit clubs does not make us lesser Muslims. We still keep to the halal haram guidelines – the muhrim and non-muhrims relationships, the no consumption of alcohol ( Coke been our staple diet ) and so forth. We did not, and till now, still do NOT smoke. After all, if you want to be jahat, you can still be jahat elsewhere. ( If you want to be bad, you can still be bad elsewhere. )

I don’t remember ignoring or neglecting life priorities back then. I remember going through proposals, working papers, quizzes all while listening to the bands – and all while writing out the song titles for each set. We did not confuse Belbin’s personality theories with Westlife’s or Linkin Park’s new songs; in fact, it was kind of fun keeping track of the music that our students listened to! During examination times, we would have the ever-helpful staff sorting out exam papers and totaling the marks for us.(Don’t worry, they did not mark the papers! ) They were all so eager to assist; either by holding out a torch or candle or just by standing behind our backs and giving us the moral support – probably, it gave them an insight into a totally different life. It moved us when some also tried to fast during the holy Ramadhan and curb the drinking habit as well. Though we all come from different social background, we sure learnt a lot from each other. Education is not only derived in a formal classroom, it could be obtained anywhere, even at the very least expected venue.

I met some of my best friends during my clubbing stints, and we still remain the best of friends – we find out now that there is more to life than just staying up late at nights, either in a seedy environment or a noisy mamak stall at Uptown, and that sometimes, it sure feels good to reminisce of the good old days. Some of us are married ( either to the band members… or the patrons… or to those who are NOT related to the music industry or club scene at all ), have our own kids where else some, might still be searching for their soul mates – one who can sing, or play the guitar, or the drum, the list goes on! Sometimes, we just can’t escape our past!

Life is… a party. So, let the music plays on.

Post-script: Contrary to what people believe, each of us is a music man / woman.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:

This entry goes out to the management and staff of Wall$t and Blues Café, in particular Sam Nair, Isaac with that gigi naga choker , Abang Buck & Chere (who made the best Diavolla pizza) , Pak Mat, Zul, Nora ( Wall$t ) and Ganesan (our Bonia watches are real la, unlike yours!), Putra, Lutfy ( Blues Café ) with a big THANK YOU!!!! Please take note that these two clubs are no longer in existence in order to make way for development or what-so-ever; nevertheless, the happy times remain. ( Of course, Planet Hollywood, Hard Rock Café and Uncle Chili’s took over after that… )

Other worth-mentioning people would have to be Suresh ‘Artstream’ Kumar aka Big Bro ( I’m also excited this being our 10^th year of acquaintance ) and his entourage; Russell, Aji, Eddie Mabuk ( I can’t believe I’m acknowledging this character! ) and Hyder, ( Sarcastic ) Glenn of Shindig, and of course, the original line-up of Skyhigh – Ali, Sham, Sudin, Kamal, Nana / Fiza / Zura, opps, Abang Man aka Papa Min, Bai, Par etc etc etc… Not to forget Factor 7’s Izan, too… Zura, thanks for putting me up – Kuching, Langkawi etc…

My partners-in-crime, Put ( may you rest in peace ), Ajun ( who introduced us to… Fredo & The Flinstones… okay lah tu, Jun! ), Wan ( sorry you had to drive us to places as none of us could drive! ) , Eddot ( aka Cleopatra .. acewah... ) , Gibb ( jangan tukar duit lagi tau! ), Halmee ( the Professor – besar dictionary tuh! ) , Baby, Nana and the sometimes party goers ( G, Jue, Jali and alamak, Marc Anthony )… I’m sorry I spoilt the surprise birthday party, guys… hehehe….