The daaeth of European drama

So I finally did it. The 4000 mile schlep across the seven seas to the haven of Bangalore theatre. Not just once but twice over.My motivation? Free tickets kindly supplied by a cousin to watch her play: An adaptation of Anton Chekhov's Cherry Orchard, called "City of Gardens". Well it was fun alright. The seating was on mattresses arranged amphitheatre-style, close to the stage. The acting was great and so was the Bangalorification of the play, though I think deeper character sketches might have made them a tad more convincing

The second play was - yawn - a done-to-death adaptation of Woyzeck: one of those dreary European plays where everyone dies. The acting was stodgy and faw-faw, and the original storyline, bleh as it was, was drawn out over 2 agonizing hours. Every so often, the hero would tumble dramatically off a cardboard box and play dead, much to the relief of the audience, only to spring back to life moments later and set off on another mind numbing monologue. My life hit rock bottom when one of the side actors (in a Vishnuvardhan style moustache and beret) climbed up on a box and talked about "daaeth". The background music was an unnervingly Indian sounding hodge-podge of various European classical composers, painstakingly named in the playbill. A vaguely admirable part of the play, however, was the set: a bizarrely painted backdrop with lots of doors and windows, that was reused as a rowhouse, a tavern and a wall for the hero to pee on.

All in all - fbbthbbp. I don't know what they were aiming at. If it was meant to be tongue-in-cheek, it worked somewhat. But if not, did they really expect to be taken seriously when the gloriously tanned hero was accused of looking "white as a sheet", or when they played chutneyed Dvorak at a tavern in small-town Germany??!! Tsk.

All said and done though, I think the overall Rangashankara experience was worth the monster schlep across town. For one, it was amazing to see so many identically dressed people in there. The collection of terra-cota jewellery, mat chappals and handloom prints in the audience could make Fab India look like Laxmi blouse-piece junction in comparison. The kid at the door gave me a "you don't deserve a playbill" look as I walked in. Luckily the sabudana vadas and the coffee at the cafe had put me in a good mood by then, so he barely escaped being strangled with his own jhola bag.

So yeah, I'll go again, But togged in my artsy-fartsy best this time, so I can look all intense and theatre-circuity. I'll atleast be guaranteed a playbill that way.

Honourable mentions: J for going gaaahahahaha during the most serious parts of the play, and A for being official shusher of the group: they'd better pay you for doing that the next time :)

Cartoon: "Go and adjust yourself at the back, girlie." - Line from Premaloka (kannada) starring Ravichandran Vishnuvardhan and Juhi Chawla.

Sexy Bach

See boss, there's no point in being indignant about some things. Like what you're not supposed to do at western classical concerts for example. We're Indian, I agree, naturally effusive, demonstratively appreciative and all that sort of thing. But sorry, no go during Bachtime. So for your own protection and that of those around you, here is a comprehensive list of don'ts at a Western Classical concert.

Suspend all activity when the music starts. If you have your finger up your nose, leave it there. If a mosquito buzzes annoyingly around you, too bad. Try and bargain with it telepathically to leave you alone in exchange for the address of a carnatic concert in the same neighbourhood.

Don't clap. You'll get into trouble. Western classical musicians lose their mojo if there's applause between movements. Mimic a 1970s concrete water-maiden until the music stops. Look around for someone who seems knowledgeable. Rub your palms non-committally when this person applauds. If the artist acknowledges the applause, clap 3 times and smile wanly.

Athough unthinkable before, it is now considered polite and modern to whistle and hoot while applauding at a classical concert. However, be warned that it is not you that should be doing it. YOU - are supposed to continue resembling a frozen coelacanth. The polite whistles should emerge from experienced polite whistlers.

Do not say Sabhash, Aaaaan and Bhale in the middle of a complex aria. Do not waggle your head and say mchxl-mchxl when the soprano hits a high C.

Do not say silly things like "Actually all weshtran musics are in Shankarabharana raaga only." Multiple carnatic music buffs in the audience will jump up immediately and say "Yes yes". They will then proceed to bore everyone senseless with comparisons to Yedhukula Kambhoji and Kiravani and there will be no end to it.

If you're bored, do not make things worse by looking at the artist's music score to see how many pages they have left to play. Chances are that the artist will play till the last page, flip the music over and play it all over again from the top. These classical musicians I tell you.

Try not to focus on the conductor's bottom, though it is the most visible part of the concert. The music does not come from there, though the rhythm does.

Your babies are cute. Leave them AT HOME. Do not inflict a stuffy adult concert on them. They are not interested. The rest of the audience isn't interested in listening to them wail through one either.

If your cell phone rings in the middle of the concert, commit hara-kiri immediately. Yes I realize it takes two people to do it. Don't worry, I will help you.

You are not allowed to arrive or leave in the middle of a piece unless you're dying. Even if you are, you'll probably live through the piece anyway, thanks to the preservative effect of your state of suspended animation.

Do not request an old hindi number at a Bach concert. Well I suppose you could, actually. Go ahead, enjoy ma.

However, do not, at the end of the request, say, "Oh what is there, anybody can play piano ting ting ping ping." I realize Shammi Kapoor has convinced you that you can produce excellent western classical by kneading imaginary chappati dough over a Baby Grand. What you don't realize is that this technique will not work unless there is a heavily mascaraed weeping woman with a bun as big as her head, a disapproving father in a dressing gown AND a grand staircase for him to hobble down.

Linger around after the concert with a polite smile on your face. Chances are you'll be photographed and captioned: "All smiles - Syamanthakamani and Selvaganapathy" on page 3 the next day.

And finally, do remember to take the program list home. You can mug up the names of the pieces and rattle them off at the unsuspecting people you have incarcerated in your basement for this purpose.

Sandalwood, here I come (ish)

Ah yes hello, I am back. And for those who don't remember me anymore, allow me me re-introduce myself. "Hello, jeste my name is Bikerdude, malayalam vooice-oaver artistte."

Whaa? Yes. This is the new me, and this what I did on my first day of official unemployment.

Whaa? Yes. I bade adieu to my software engineer avatar a couple of weeks ago to see if I could pursue my true interests in the arts. Well atleast that's what I wrote in my resignation letter. Bwahaha. I'm not sure how much pursuing I'm going to be doing, but this was definitely an interesting start:

A few months ago, I got in touch with Suchitra Lata, an immensely talented musician/composer and virtuoso veena player, who very sweetly invited me to check out her studio in Jaynagar. They do some amazing indie jazz-fusion music, aside from mainstream stuff like jingles, voice overs and radio clips. Suchitra's brilliant Album Mobius Strip (2006) has a dreamy loungey sort of feel to it, with very crisply executed veena leads all through. A wonderfully refreshing change from the usual ersatz tracks that you hear in our page 3 lounge bars across town.

So off I went to the studio last week. After I'd gawped at the all studio equipment and was sufficiently bowled over by Suchitra's fusion tracks, she asked me if I'd like do a voice over for a photo printer ad. "Um, sure", I said, and was led into the recording room and asked to sit in front of an extremely cool looking mike. She handed me a 4 page manuscript with a series of jalebis drawn onto it. I was to do the voice-over in Goad's oawn Language.

Whaa? Yes.

"Err.. no English?" I asked nervously. "Err, no English", she said, "Unless you want to do the voice over in Tamil or Gujarati. I stared at the jalebis intently, hoping I'd suddenly be able to read the script as fluently as I could as a kid. No hope there. I finally gave up and begged to be excused for a day so I could go home home, weep for an hour and then attempt to make sense out of it.

After several hours of laborious Malayalam-to-English transliteration (and standing out in the rain to get the perfect nasal twang), I went back to the studio to do the voice-over. Gokul, the brilliant sound engineer, smiled encouragingly at me through the glass window of the recording room and cued me to begin.

"Namaskaram, ende peru Bikerdude. Njaan oru photographer aanu..." (Hello I am Bikerdude and I am a photographer....) I began, looking steadfastly away from Suchitra who had collapsed on the studio floor in uncontrollable giggles the moment I began speaking in my rah-rah malayalam accent. Gokul played my voice back over the headphones. I looked around for a sharp intrument to end everybody's agony right there. Apparently they were used to reactions like mine, and had padded the studio walls as a precautionary measure. After several re-takes and some cool cut-paste jobs by Gokul, the voice-over was ready. It was maginally less hijrotic than when I first started, but still sounded like Hermann Gundert on coconut schnapps.

"I sing and play the guitar a bit too, you know.." I told Suchitra hesitantly, after we'd done the voice over. "Oh?" she said. "Let's do a scratch recording then." It was for a kannada film track. The lyrics hadn't come in yet, she said. But not to worry, I could sing it anyway using the phrases 'love me', 'touch me', 'kiss me', and 'oooh bayyyybehh' in random order.

I sang. Gokul recorded, and played back the track over the headphones. It sounded like a cross between a foghorn and Rajamma miss. They made me sing the same track in a higher key. It sounded like a cross between the HMT factory siren and Rajamma miss.

"Uh-huh, cool, so lets see how that works out", Suchitra said diplomatically, after I was done. "And next time, try not to wobble so much while you sing, yeah?" I simpered, melted into a puddle and trickled down the studio stairs into my car .

So if you hear of mass-malayalee-suicides resulting from a printer infomercial, you'll know who was responsible. And as for me being the next kannada singing sensation, don't hold your breath. I'm not quite sure "Love, touch, kiss or hold me in no particular order baby" will make it to the top ten countdown any time soon.

Thanks tons Suchitra and Gokul for being so patient and long-suffering. You really are awesome people!!

Sandalwood = The kannada film industry ala Bollywood, Kollywood, Tollywood etc.

Commercial Eat

One of the happiest moments in my mother's life, she says, is when they built her a luxury ladies' toilet on Dispensary road in the late eighties. This facility essentially doubled her shopping time, which in turn meant that my brother and I got twice as much food to eat, to prevent us from grumbling. I therefore dedicate this post to that life-saving toilet, for introducing us to the gourmet delights of charming Commercial Street.

Most of the shops on Commercial street are atleast as old as I am, and many older than my grandmother. Which, I have been instructed by her to inform you, isn't that old, ok? But if you'd like to give the shopping a miss and concentrate like I do on the food, a good place to start is the slightly overpriced, but lovely Woody's.

Stop sniggering, I think the owners of Woody's wanted to do a hep take on Woodlands, a bigger restaurant chain, when they opened this joint. Do try their dee-licious kotte-kadabus from coastal Karnataka: fragrant rice idlies steamed in cylindrical baskets(called kottes) woven from thaaLe-yele leaves. Slurp. Don't hesitate to try all the other yummy stuff on their menu. As long as you can get over the staff who will ignore you even if you commit hara-kiri at the counter, and the mechanical lady who'll say "Towkenn Fifffty Ffffour" in an ominous voice every 5 minutes or so.

A couple of buildings to the left, is the famous Bhagatram Sweets. Legend has it that the stoves of Bhagatram have never stopped burning since the shop opened in 1948. I can say without hesitation, that they make the world's best Sindhi gulab jamoons. Also do try their gorgeous jalebis, their lovely dumroat (baked yellow pumpkin halwa) and their chandrakala (a gulab jamoon stuffed in a badshah dipped in kesar-flavoured syrup. Sob!). Their carrot halwa and their famous 4pm samosas are superlatively delicious too. They moved from their dungeon like shop (lovingly named the Tunnel of Love) into a rather ordinary place next door a couple of years ago. The charming couple (Mr and Mrs Bhagatram Jr.?) that manage the shop speak a singsong mish-mash of Tamil,Kannada, English and Sindhi to their staff and customers, that many people stop by just to listen to.

Diagonally across the street is Anand sweets, equally well known and just as delicious. Their chaat section has some rather unusual numbers that I'm a little hesitant to try. While they have an array of mouthwatering North Indian sweets, do try their badam milk - absolutely hits the spot after a hot and hassled shopping spree. If you're tired of sweet things to eat, step to the back lane of commercial street where you can eat some really yummy streetside dosa and those odd looking triangular samosas.

Midway down Commercial street is the lovely Shiv Sagar. This is a standard Udupi joint with a humungous vegetarian menu, often bordering on the bizarre. Their Mexican selection has enchiladas (more like enchina maarayas* actually) topped with kissan sauce, and their pizzas have about a km. of grated amul cheese on their heads. Eh, whom are we kidding, they're delicious. Eat your heart out, Naples. But if you're not in the mood for experimentation, their North Indian and Indian-chinese selection will definitely appeal to your palate. Not to mention their array of excellent idlis, dosas and other scrumptious South Indian specialities. Top it all off with a Gud-Bud (Udupi special sundae with a story), Merry Window Special, or one of the millions of other lovely sundaes on the menu. Sorry, but you definitely need to visit Shiv Sagar about 15 times before you can decide whether you like it or not.

At the end of commercial street (on Kamaraj Rd actually), is a little ice cream shop tucked away in the basement of a run down complex. If you havent eaten tamarind or jamoon ice cream before, you must go there. Seriously though, Natural Ice Creams has some delicious all-natural seasonal flavours that will suprise you. My favourites are tender coconut and sugarcane-ginger. Do cut them some slack though. They're usually poorly stocked and the staff is sometimes frosty, but they'll warm up to you once you make a few appreciative noises and solicious enquiries about the ice cream.

Around the corner from Naturals, on Dispensary road, is the yummy Lalita's paratha point. Really good parathas of every shape and flavour and some surprisingly good biriyani. Do try when you're starving and want a great, satisfying punjabi meal. A little further up the road from Lallo's is Tiwari bros, a Calcutta based sweet shop with standard issue marwari sweets and some nice samosa-kachori sort of situations to go with them. They don't use onions or garlic, so this is a good place for fussy foodies or couples who, um, intend to have a long romantic evening in close proximity.

And now that you've eaten, it's time to check out commercial street's shopping wonders (preferably in a car at 40kmph). Check out the famous ladies' lane and the chappal gully where you can easily waste away and die unnoticed waiting for your female companions to finish. Go to the Green Shop, Brown Shop, Royal Mens Wear, Jean Junction or Your Shop(pe) for clothes, suitcases and sundries. Take a dekko at Eastern Stores, Bangalore's biggest woollens shop until the eighties. The owner of Eastern Stores will weasel his way into your heart (and wallet) by saying endearing things like "This is your shop ma, your shop. Take it and go ma, yours only". Also check out the series of ladies' tailors (all named Mr Rao) on Dispensary rd., and C Krishniah Chetty and sons, an expensive but exquisite jewellery store in an antique building in the middle of the street. Do walk around and check out the scores of other venerable old shopping institutions on the street when you have the time.

Frankly though, two venerable institutions down and I'm ready to tank up on some yummy Bhagatram gulab-jamoons again.

*Enchina maaraya = "Whaaaat I say?" in Tulu

And the winners are...

Yes my dearies, it's prize distribution time.

The winners of the most scandalous and/or entertaining stories about cheap places to eat at MG road (see comments section of previous post on the same subject) are:

1. The anonymous VAN: For wearing a tie to Koshy's. And for being from cwashtal AndhrPradeshandi.

2. The human bean: For posting 6 comments in 48 seconds.

3. Karen: For spoiling his chances by mentioning multinational food chains.

4. Scribbler: Ladies/Chinese quota.

Consolation prize: Bikerdude, for doing admirable clean up job of majestic loo like usage of comment space.

Honourable mentions:

Nigel Jeejeebhoy: For vivid descriptions of MG Road in the early jurassic period.

Anoushka: Because I already drew her.

Pri: In the hope that she'll get over that ghastly kheer kadam at some point

And the rangashankara crowd: Please do not kill me.

And finally, the prize:
Bonda soup for yevverybody, commaaan yenjaay I say.

MG Road for under 50 bucks

"If y'all don't 'ave pots of money, there's not much you can do on MG road men", I heard a friend moan. Actually he said yuvarself instead of y'all and paatsu instead of pots (he was from Nellore dishtrict), but I couldn't print that. Suitably challenged, I wandered off to the end of MG road and decided to take a stroll down to see how many places I could still get a satisfying meal at, for under 50 bucks.

First stop- K C Das on Church St. Ok stop screaming, I know those sweets are ridiculously priced. But here's the trick. Step in, sit yourself down and order a plate of luchis or motor kachuri with alurdom and yellow dal. Or maybe a couple of singaras, a rasgulla or three and some deliciously divine mishti doi. Slllurrrrp. When the surly waiter flings the bill at your face, you'll be pleasantly surprised to see that you've only drummed up a bill of about 40 rupees or so! They also sell sweets per piece which work quite well with your budget. Those cashew/pista balls are dangerously priced at 17 bucks apiece though.

Tumble about 20m downhill from KC das and walk into Sheshamahal restaurant. This certainly has to be the pleasantest south indian restaurant for miles. Try their hearty bonda-soup in the evenings. Ok go crazy and throw in a maddur vade, some nippat-chakli and mangalore bajji and wash it all down with some filter coffee. Not more than 35 bucks, I assure you. Happiness joyness! Oh and do try their oota (lunch) section which is actually on the MG side, in a small lane beside Arya bhavan sweets.

Which brings me to Arya Bhavan sweets. Lovely, surly staff, and a variety of low-priced sweets and chaats to choose from. Try their speciality: Baby chaat kachori. A sort of edible flour basket filled with all manner of yummy things. Might burn a hole in your stomach, but not in your wallet. Ha ha. Manchi joku kaadhandi? Also try their excruciatingly sweet malai lassi. Lovely for a brilliant 23 minute sugarbuzz.

For some really great filter coffee, try India coffee depot, a small hole in the wall opposite Premier bookstore on Museum Road. The kindly gentleman there has a strange system. He'll take 5 rupees from you and hand you a doubled paper cup full of piping hot filter coffee. He'll then walk in, tear a coupon ceremoniously out of a book, rip it up into shreds and fling it out of the window, all the time smiling and making small talk as you finish your coffee.

Pani puri my loves? Try the chaat walla right around the corner from India coffee depot. Deeeelicious pani puri (sooji ke hain sir, ek dum mulaayam) for ten bucks, with a sookha poori (with channa, lemon and a magic chaat masala) thrown in for free. The best gabuk-gabuk-ten-rufis-thank-you place ever.

For round-the-clock cheap food, there's no place like Empire. A vast menu, immaculately dressed staff and many, many inebriated clubbers on a Saturday night. Try their shawarma rolls and dosa-chicken combos. Also their yum ghee rice, dal fry, kerala/ceylon parathas, chikken gebaabuh (kabab in Malabari-speak), lychee melba and much much more. Their Arabic restaurant upstairs is a little disappointing, but the food's not bad at all for the price.

For more inexpensive South Indian, try Kaycees down the road. Their lunch thalis, especially the Naarth Indian mini-meals, where you get to choose the gravy that accompanies your fluffy white kulchas, are really quite delicious.

Midway down MG road, it's been business as usual at the India Coffee House. For the past 4000 years. The grouchy waiters, also around the same age, have for some reason become uber polite these days. Gone are the days when they'd bite your head off if you dared to ask for a pepper shaker. They now stand around in an avuncular fashion, and even half salute when you tip them. While their cutlets, sandwiches, coffee and masala dosas are not bad at all, do not miss their slurpily yumptious scrambled eggs. They are arguably the best in Bangalore, and served on toast in VERY chipped china. Super value for money.

Walk down Brigade road and up rest house crescent (or Pecos lane as it is more popularly known) and the first thing you hear is some super cool music from a green spiral staircase. That, my dear friends, is the infamous Pecos - Brigade road's best kept... err non-secret. Step in, and well, step out, if you don't get it. But if you do, welcome to what was once my world. Beautiful (sob sob) music, cheap beer that on a good day tastes like Rosy chechi's dishwater, natural airconditioning (I'm not kidding. Sit by the window that overlooks Pick 'n' Move), a sav crowd and surprisingly affordable food. Try their tacos and sausage steamed rice with your dishwater. Slurp.

A little past Pecos on the left, is the infamous Dubai Plaza that houses the lovely 'Taste of Tibet'. A smash hit with the college crowd, here's where you can gorge on momos, phingsha, tingmo, thupka and all manner of unpronounceable Tibetan things for very little money. You'll soon learn to love the slow motion movements of the staff, the lovely tomato relish and the tinkly Tibetan music that comes free with every meal!

How can I end any food story without a mention of my favourite eatery (mostly for non food related reasons) - Nilgiri's. Walk into the newly refurbished cakeshop and help yourself to puffs, pastries and all manner of yummy things for well under 20 bucks. They now even have pre-packaged dosa-chutney, poori-and-potato sort of deals that you have to zap in the microwave before you eat, which quite frankly look rather yucky. What you might want to check out is their 10-paise-per-gram lunch buffet, where an endearingly grouchy attendant spoons out as much rice, gravy and curry as you want into a plate and charges you by weight. Fascinating, and quite flattering when you notice she's written your weight down as 188 grams.

And that, I think, (besides Ullas refreshments, Brindavan Wotel and the noodle person on Dickenson Rd), brings my cheap and best MG road eateries story to a close. Other places, stories of unimaginable illnesses from eating at said places, anecdotes and observations most welcome!

Aargh-apella!

Friday, the 20th could well have been the 13th.

"Hey, let's go listen to Stanford University's acapella group perform today", said a friend. "Aye thu come ya, It will be fun, and besides how bad can it be? They're only performing for 45 minutes." "Oh them?", I said, googling furiously. They were called Raagapella, I discovered. Stanford university's South Asian focussed all-male acapella group. Oho. They'd been selected as part of Stanford's eight acapella groups through a gruellingly intense audition process. Achacha. They only got 3 hours of sleep a night, because of all the practices, the article said. Mchxl mchxl. "Uyyo cammaaan I say" I hollered back into the phone at the friend, and off we went.

We reached the Alliance Française half an hour early, hoping to catch seats in what we thought would be a packed house. The group was performing as part of the Fête de la Musique, a free music evening showcasing musical talent from all over the country and beyond.

The show was running about an hour late as usual. Which was cool because it gave us time to check out the group that was playing before them: a talented but fairly pedestrian jazz-fusion group, with a cherubic dude on the western drums, a slightly apologetic looking Indian percussionist and a lost bass-guitarist. My brain switched off the moment the apologetic percussionist switched on his laptop and played an ersatz background score for them to drum over. A couple of well executed, intricate konnukol interludes and bland guitar riffs (all at an earsplittingly high decibel level) later, they left. Hopefully straight to the shower that they'd forgotten to take before coming on stage.

A hush fell over the audience. About ten men, identically clad in red zari-kurtas walked in and took their positions on stage. "Ah, there they are", sighed the friend and settled into her seat, looking forward to a fabulous hour ahead. The lead kurta fluttered down from on stage. "Hi how are you guys doin'?" (Oooerr. Ah well they've been in the US for a while, I suppose the NRI twang is forgiveable.) "We're Raaegapeylla", he said, launching into a long winded explanation of the type of music they were into. A few "raaeguhs" and "taaeluhs" into his speech, and I had zoned out. I even missed the part where he explained why girls in particular were supposed to like their music. I was taking bites out of the seat in front of me by then.

Finally, they began. Lead kurta blew into a pitch pipe, pumped his arm up and down with the skill of a Saidapet housewife at 4am, and the group began to hum a low 3-note chord. The pitch pipe hadn't helped. They were flat. Kurta after kurta fluttered down to the mike and sang a line each (flat), before taking their places back with the red mass of gyrating hips on stage, still on the same chord (flat). We looked at each other. "Probably not warmed up", we reassured each other, and waited for the next song.

A scientist type slithered down to the mike next, his longish hair in straggly wisps around a standard issue wide-eyed NRI leer. "Hope you guys are doin' just fab tonight. We're now gonna do a modal (dai!) piece for you guys in a Raega and its based on a shlogum." (Ah. Tamil-ABCD. Hmm.) "We've also tried to mix in a John Denver number" (Aiyo! Poor fellow what he did to you I say?). "But first, Im gonna do you an aalaa-banai" (Uh huh, definitely Tamil).

The visions in red went "Pum-pum-pum-PUMMM" for about 40 seconds, which I later figured was supposed to have been the sound of a tanpura (left out in the rain for 40 days and 40 nights presumably). A billy goat bleated out from somewhere. The Alliance caretaker jumped up with his stick to chase it away, but sat down suspiciously when he realized that the sound was coming from on stage. It was long haired scientist type. He had closed his eyes and was doing his aalaa-banai. It was - ooh, you guessed? Flat. He'd suddenly shudder from head to toe and go a-a-a-a-a-a-a, presumably to placate the djinn that had jumped into his pajamas before the concert. Finally, he left. The Chinese (north-east-indian?) member of the group came down to sing his line: A deep bass growl emerged from his dimunitive figure. Not half bad! Pretty darned good even. Unfortunately his elaborate churidar had slid down over his feet and made him look like a handsomish Yoda. "Song sung, I nicely have", I thought I heard him murmur before he flapped back upstage.

Long-haired scientist type came back down and went "tae kit ta tah, ta laengu takka tah." for 2 minutes, accompanied by a voice-percussionist member of the group. I had finished chewing the chair in front of me, and was gnawing pensively on my friend's obligingly offered shoulder by then. My cell phone buzzed. It was a distress message from Missy M, whom I had also invited to watch the spectacle: "Headache. Pain. Must go. Will talk. Later. Water. Room service."

I couldn't take any more either. I left quietly after the song was over, and cried into my pillow all night.

Stanford Raagapella. I have two words to say to you: "What the...?!!"
OK three: "Fbbbthhhbbpp".

Acknowledgements: Mem (for offering gnawable shoulder), Subz (for scarring us for life), Apps (for being long suffering and stoic)

Placatory disclaimer: Don't get all hot under the collar boys, you weren't so bad. Just tune up a bit and you'll be fine.