Kaohsiung in song

First of all, I'd just like to point out that this is my hundredth consecutive post on this blog. And, while the perfectionist in me would like to pour hours and hours of time into it so that it does not suck, I'm fairly certain that a) none of you really care; b) I've killed any chances of it being epic by simply mentioning that this is my 100th post; and c) I do actually care about getting some sleep tonight.

And not without reason: tomorrow, I will sing the American national anthem at a MLB game. Not alone, of course, and not in America, but STILL: tomorrow myself, 5 other Fulbrighters, and a group of high school students from the Kaohsiung American school will sing the American national anthem a the Taiwanese MLB All-Star Game.

So, yeah, we'll be on international TV.

Today, though, was just practice, which essentially entailed the group of us standing in the hot sun in the baseball stadium, waiting our turn to run-through the song a couple times. That, and taking jumping pictures.

Umm, I think we have a problem here...

Love the facial expressions...and we're getting closer!

Win!

Annnd epic win!

But I'll have plenty to write about on that account tomorrow and Sunday, after we've actually done more than a run-through followed by a long speech by the mayor, who came for the performance.

So, to rewind a bit: this morning, my 5th and 6th graders had a field trip! And I, naturally, went with them. It was a short affair; we walked the five or so blocks to our destination, and the whole trip took about an hour and a half. But it was fun! We went to Qing-Shan's original building, which has since been converted into a government factory which manufactures clothes for Taiwanese soldiers.

We meandered around the old complex, the kids getting important tidbits of information from the Director of Academic Affairs, in Chinese, while I savored the scenery and absorbed the occasional paraphrase by Patty. The complex was actually quite picturesque.

When we went inside for the actual tour, I found myself wondering who would wear the clothes, and about the home lives of the workers--I had been told that a good number of my students' parents work here, and I wondered which ones they were? No way to tell--when they saw me trailing along at the tail end of the procession, their reactions were universally gasps and occasionally a proffered English phrase like "Hello!"

Our procession.

So that was our field trip.

Fast forwarding a bit, past the MLB practice, song came into my life a second time today, at Zhong Shan Da Shue's (中山大學) 13th annual "Singing Contest in Chinese & Taiwanese for the Foreign Students." In other words, glorified karaoke.

Here's how that went down: some people sucked. Like really, really sucked. The first guy to lead off was one of those, which I appreciated as a boost to everyone's confidence. Then there were a few people who were okay, and a few who were absolutely fantastic and need a record label to notice them now.

That would be this guy. He also needs to stop wearing v-neck shirts now, but I won't quibble.

One group even dressed up in costume and did a comedic bit, which was pretty great.

And then there was us.

At the last second, Tiffiany had to leave because she had a bus to Kenting to catch for her birthday weekend (because sometimes life is just rough, you know?), and so our teacher recruited some of her other students, a group of French guys, to help us sing our song.

Yeah...that did not go so smoothly.

The thing is, they knew the chorus of the song, but that was about it. Not that we were too much better--we had our lyrics sheets in hand--but we had at least practiced it; knew what we were doing and had agreed weeks in advance to standing in front of a crowd and singing this particular song. (I blogged about it clear back in the beginning of October.)

So here's what ended up happening: the four of us who had prepared stood on one side of the stage, intermittently singing and laughing at ourselves, with a single microphone pointed, not at any of our mouths, but at a generalized point in the middle. I'm fairly certain no one could hear us.

On the other side of the stage stood the French guys, leading the crowd in clapping (clapping??? For Wode Bao Bei???) and chiming in whenever the chorus rolled around. And did I mention they had their own mike?

Fortunately, as I mentioned, we were still laughing. A few audience members laughed, too, which was more a relief than anything else. Because what else could we expect from that scenario? As Lydia said while we were leaving, in that sort of situation you have to be either completely amazing, or completely sucky and able to laugh at yourselves. I'd say we probably fell into the latter category.

Nonetheless, We'll be back out on the baseball field tomorrow, singing our hearts out for an international audience: proof that talent matters infinitely less than tenacity and happening to be one of the only Americans in Kaohsiung. And, as this 100th post attests, I have no talent but the talent of staying constant, whether to blogging, to being American, or to singing--poorly.