We went to the Soho yet again tonight. I wouldn't mention it, as normally the visits to the bar are routine: Haggle with the bartenders, get a 40 ounce bottle of vodka and some coke for 250 yuan, drink, chat with Li Bin Hui and the gogo girls, then stumble home. However, this time was a lot cooler. We only went because there was apparently some kind of party occuring today. Apparently, even days are lucky, as are Saturdays, and since 2 and 6 add up to 8 (a Chinese lucky number, or so I'm told), today is especially lucky. Chalk another one up for Chinese superstition.
Anyway, there were fireworks all over the place today, and Soho was having some special party. Li Bin Hui even text messaged me ahead of time to make sure I was coming, and he wanted to know how many people I was bringing. I'm going to guess that most, if not all, bars and anything else open late at night were celebrating tonight, because we had a brownout. The entire bar lost power. No music, no lights, nothing. It would've been pitch black, if Soho didn't have candles lit at every table as part of its look.
They lit even more candles, and kept selling booze right through, but they were facing the dilemma of entertaining the guests (ourselves included). They tried getting one of the bartenders to do his normal routine of juggling flaming bottles, but he was too drunk (possibly our fault... whoops), and the gogo dancers had nothing to dance to, so they just tried to look pretty and get people drunk.
So what happens? Drunken Laowhy attack! Jessica, Alex and Chris got up on stage, and did anything they could, while I was cheering from our table, and entertaining the tables around me. I tried to get up on stage, but Li Bin Hui told me not to, as apparently, I had been designated the job of entertaining the entire back of the bar. Li Bin Hui started bringing me free beer to cheers (Ganbay!) with people, and the girls and Chris were getting flaming shots up on stage to shoot, just to entertain people. Watching white people actually kept them happy for quite some time!
Because of all the cheers'ing we were doing, the whole night was hazy, but I'm glad I remember it all. We made a train of Chinese people, we gave English lessons, Chris and I sang on stage (everything from Happy Birthday, to Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, to We Will Rock you). We Will Rock You went surprisingly well, because the beat was easy to keep, people actually helped, and they knew the lyrics, which was mind boggling! Apparently, everyone knows the words to Happy Birthday too, but they didn't like that one so much, I think because they knew it wasn't the gogo girl's birthday like we tried to pass off. Tough crowd.
Eventually, the bar stopped giving us booze (I'm told the manager is quite cheap, we get most of our free stuff from the lower employees and supervisors), so other customers starting giving us shots and drinks to keep dancing and singing. The only part of the night where I nearly got too drunk to control myself was around this time. One of the customers handed me a glass of what I thought was beer, and got me to Ganbay the bar from the stage. It turned out to be whisky. Now, the reason this hit me hard was because Ganbay is not like our version of Cheers. When someone yells Ganbay, you are expected to finish your drink, not sip from it. So I was there, up on stage with my half drunken swagger, and I yelled Ganbay and threw back my drink. Discovering that it was a full glass of whisky actually took me a few seconds after I had swallowed because my mouth was numb.
By the time 1 AM hit, most of the patrons had gone home, bored of the weird foreigners, so we took the juggling bartender, Li Bin Hui, and the gogo girls out to barbeque. It was a lot of fun, since I finally got to talk to Li Bin Hui outside of his work, and everybody sort of taught each other a bit of Chinese or English. I still struggle with the tones though. Jiao has 4 meanings I know of so far, depending on the tone (dime, name, teach, and pepper - as in green pepper). The gogo girls paid for the barbeque, which frustrated me a bit, since I know that while going out is relatively cheap for me, it isn't easy on their wallets, but I'm determined to pay the next round. Chris apparently treated them to a 200 yuan meal the other day anyway.
The Soho people are awesome. They treat us so well, they're fun, and they keep finding us ways to get free stuff, which is always a bonus. We ended the night with some arm wrestling between the Chinese guys and the White guys, and Rock Paper Scissors, which truly is an international sport. All in all, a very fun night, and I now love Chinese brownouts.
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