Confessions of a Cat-holic (75)

The karaoke sessions usually started with one or two person. I was the early and punctual one who always showed up on time. It would be joined by Vivian or sometimes Tracy.

Tracy was by far the richest girl in my year. As I said, there were no tycoons by the time I transferred so a resident at Tregunter Towers would easily qualify as the wealthiest in my year. Yes, Tracy resided at Tregunter Towers on Tregunter Path, the classic Central mid-levels residence of luxury. But she was not the typical SPCC student with a Central-has-it-all mindset. She was one of the most down to earth persons I knew and she would always be there for her friends. Her grades were only okay and she enrolled at class D with Rex, the repeater.

Last time I spoke to her, she worked as an audit accountant at CITIC bank (or a Chinese bank of the likes) after graduating from USC. She dated a guy from my beloved St Joseph's College, namely Nick Yau, who was an athlete in his school and the second generation of a renowned old money family. They met each other in Los Angeles when he matriculated at a local community college in Southern California.

Tracy and Vivian were best friends. I was the newcomer, so of course I did not dream to share the same intimacy as their friendship. I liked to arrive early at their karaoke sessions because I liked hanging out with them. I liked them because they were different from the other Central wannabes who lived their lives like those Hunger Game tributes. RIP, my fellow SPCCers. I enjoyed your survival acts to reach Capitol City. Deeply entertained, I would like to have the sponsors on my team nevertheless.

Vivian and Tracy liked to turn off all the lights to make it really dim in the karaoke rooms, so that we could only barely see each other's face. Tracy usually had make up on, and the coverage of powder on her face was rather obvious. She also had the signature MK-style light brown hair, despite the school policies. Vivian, on the other hand, only started to wear make up after she finished college. It was a fine line between emo goth and MK.

They never sang any songs in the karaoke sessions and they always made me the first to start singing. I was a shy performer because I was conscious of my lack of singing talents. But I would go ahead and sing anyways because, as a matter of fact, I truly liked pop music.

After they turned off the lights, they would be ordering drinks like pussy foot and fruit punch, with alcohol too sometimes. But we were underage at the time. They had very good relationships with the managers at Neway, Big Echo and California Red, because they were frequent customers, obviously. When I declined their invitation to sing solo, they would just be playing their favorite song collection of Nicholas Tse, Joey Yung and Cecilia Cheung on vocal mode. And the managers would come greet them with a free jar of beers and other drinks. Within seconds, they would be starting to play those drinking games which you had to guess the opponents' next act to close or open their fists. When they lost, they would have to drink whisky with green tea.

I wouldn't join their drinking games because I sucked at it. Everytime I played with them, I lost like a fiasco. I didn't like the smell of alcohol and I didn't enjoy the drinking part of the games. But I liked to tag along and just watched them play.

Vivian liked to tell me to try those spot-the-difference games for kids on the karaoke machine screens when I was not singing. I usually enjoyed them, as much as I enjoyed their presence.

They liked to turn the air conditioner at a temperature which felt like freezing, in a way to dissipate the smoke. Yes, they would be smoking, at the same time when they were drinking. I wouldn't smoke though, even though they offered me a cigarette every time I joined their karaoke sessions. I was not particularly fond of the smell of cigarettes. But I was fine with my friends smoking in the room. My mother was a smoker. Inhaling her second hand smoke ever since I was a kid, I made a vow to myself that I would never start this bad habit of nicotine addiction.