My first public performance...

At last it's Tuesday, an off day for me. Funny how your days seem to be longer at work than at home. Anyway, the only event that recently stood apart from the rest of my mundane life was my grandmother's 71st birthday last Saturday. Ahh, it was that time of the year again where I showed another side of me, for some reason. I guess it's not everytime I post something like this on my blog but what the heck, embarass me for all you want...

Some years ago my cousin mentioned something which I haven't forgotten until today: "Every year, you have to embarass yourself once - on your birthday." I know it wasn't my birthday, and I've certainly been embarassed many times before, but this time it wasn't just any embarassment. In fact, maybe it wasn't an embarassment after all. I don't know, you decide...

I performed on my grandmother's birthday. On a stage. In front of everyone. In a public restaurant. Oh well, it was a good experience. Made my adrenaline pump so hard I nearly fainted. But before I show you glimpses of my dark secret, my Mr. Hyde side of me, let me get to the bottom of things, of how I ended up on stage in the first place...

There was a band playing already when I first entered the restaurant. For some reason the waiter who was serving our table asked if there was anyone who wanted to sing. Not that I put my hand up or something. My younger cousins, as usual, all ganged up to point fingers at me and told the waiter that I wanted to sing. Of course I declined. It wasn't until the restaurant staff came out singing Happy Birthday for my grandmother that I happened to do something which triggered the event. What did I do, you ask? I just sang the last sentence of Happy Birthday in a different part, that's all. The waiter came up to me and teased me, saying, "I heard you sing!"

Well what do you expect? I didn't even know what to sing. Then one of my cousins suggested La Bamba. I thought for a moment, "Hey, that's not a bad choice. But the band can't play that song (I saw their song book earlier on), and what if I forget the words?" Then my cousin said her father could play La Bamba on the guitar. Checked. Another cousin of mine (some of you may have seen the name Vanessa around) had an iPod with the Punk Rock version of La Bamba inside. Can you believe that? They even made it into a Punk Rock number. I was taken aback at first but I knew I had no time to waste: I refreshed my memory of the lyrics once again...

And so the dreaded time came for the two of us, my uncle and I, to go up on stage and perform. Naturally my whole family took out their camera phones to start taking pictures and even videoed our performance. I had the chance to bring back some, if not all, on my own phone. So here are the pictures; kind of blur, of course, but what the heck, right?

I guess this was just before we started to perform. I was probably asking my uncle, "How are you going to start?"

And off we went! "Para bailar la bamba, para bailar la bamba se necesita un a poca de gracia..."

I was coaxing the diners to clap their hands...

You see that arm with a camera phone right in front of my face? Yeah, I'm very sure it was my cousin Joshua. He was the only one filming us up close and personal...

Here I am looking like I'm in a trance or something. It's really an out-of-body feeling whenever I perform. I become oblivious to my surroundings...

And this should be the finale. I just remembered something at this point, "How do we end?" La Bamba usually fades away but you can't just fade away when it comes to performing live. Good thing my uncle knew how to end the song well. Thanks a lot, uncle! Without you on the guitar I could never have performed without music!