In Continuum.

So, the lot of us got to visit the set of Don't Forget the Lyrics, all thanks to a guy named New - yes, that's his name, New. This is how it worked: New has a friend and that friend has a friend, and this friend is called Jeremy. Jeremy has a lot of friends, and New needed about thirty people to fill in the seats at the studio recording of the show, since he happens to work there. So New asked his friend to ask his friend (Jeremy), to ask his friends if they (including myself) were interested in going. Most of us jumped at the chance, and I was particularly excited since I haven't been to the Mediacorp for the longest time. Anyway, so Jeremy gathered about twelve people to go down to Caldecott Hill last Sunday to witness the taping of the show, though Jody backed out in the last minute because it was her father's birthday. So it was Sarah and Khye, Ting Ting and Jeremy, Nicholas and Flora, Joyce and Jun Rong, Kevin, Neptina and myself at the taping, which proved to be a tiring and yet fun night for all of us. For those of you reading this right now, take note of the special celebrity episode that is going to air very soon, and pay close attention to the group of people seated on the left hand side of your television screen. If you see anybody familiar doing very unglamorous things, do not be surprised - that's really us. 

So the day began with Neptina and I meeting up, and we watched the latest episode of The Office (which is by the way, hilarious) at my place before heading down to Bishan for her haircut, avoiding the storm at the very same time. There were two things that really needed to be done before going down to Mediacorp yesterday. One, she wanted to get her haircut, and actually spend more than twenty dollars this time around because things were getting slightly out of control. Two, both of us had a craving for Subway for some reason, and I was surfing through the Bishan Junction 8 website the other night (don't ask) when I realized that there is a Subway outlet at that place which I didn't know about. It is strange, because I have been going to that same mall so many times, and never have I came across any Subway outlets before. I do not deny that I was secretly excited that there was a hidden outlet near my place, which also meant a convenient supply of healthy sandwich - love! Anyway, so those were our two missions for the day, in which we set off from my place to complete before heading over to Caldecott Hill. 

Neptina was particularly jumpy about her new haircut, but then again who isn't when you are going under the knife (or scissors, in this case). That is the risk you have to take whenever you want to look radically different in terms of your hairstyle, and there is always a high chance for things to go very wrong even when you pay a large amount of money. It doesn't really matter if you are going for those ten-minute speed cutting, or the professional ones that have an obscene price tag. Things could go wrong, and that is what you have to remember every time you decide to have a haircut that involves anything more than shaving off an inch of your hair. I know, because I have been through that numerous times, disasters like that have happened so many times that I don't even know where to begin anymore. The cheapest haircut I've ever gotten was two dollars, and it was that Malay family on Tekong who shaved all our heads on the very first day of the army. Seriously, that was a harrowing experience, but I do admit that a bald head requires the least amount of attention on a daily basis. It does feel colder for the most part, but it needed so little attention that I was as good as being without hair for the most part. 

Anyway, so Neptina got her hair done by the hair stylist, and it turned out - amazing. It took a while for her to get used to things, but I suppose that was one mission done and one more to go at that point. I suppose the lot of you could laugh at me being retarded, because I thought "Subway Niche" is a smaller version of "Subway", like "Subway Express" or something. We went into the basement according to the directory and looked around, and we couldn't find the Subway outlet at all. Then, to our realization, Subway Niche is really a little kiosk that sold fresh fruit juices, none of the giant sandwich greatness that the both of us love so much. That was when I denounced counterfeit fast food outlets, and that sub-standard food stores should not use the names of greater food stores out there. The same with Crocodile and Lacoste by the way, with one of them being a cheap imitation of the other, in my opinion. So we settled for second best - Pizza Hut, and we go to that place so often that we could become the mascot of that place. Pizza Hut really doesn't have a mascot if you think about it, it doesn't even have a walking pizza or something like that. Oh, by the way, we both think Mos Burger is lame. Because. Mos Burger is the This Fashion of fast food, and I suppose insults don't get any worse than that in the fast food world. 

We shopped around for some time, and let's just say that Bishan Junction 8 is wearing thin on me these days. It's not exactly a very exciting place to begin with, and it isn't helped by the fact that the place is loaded with unwanted memories around the corners. Anyway, we decided to go down to Mediacorp a little earlier than the rest, and we saved a bar of Kinder Buenos for later at the reception. I didn't know bus 156 takes us straight to Mediacorp from my place, though that doesn't necessarily excite me. I used to think that the television broadcast center is some sort of Mecca, since every entertainment related to the television comes from that very same place. When I was younger, I didn't know about how you could buy drama serials and cartoons from overseas, which was also why I thought Transformers was produced by Singaporeans. Then my mother taught me a couple of things here and there, and I realized that Mediacorp (which was then SBC and then later TCS) wasn't as great as I thought. I remember visiting that place about eight or nine years ago for the taping of Under One Roof. Yes, that is how long it has been for me, when that show was actually famous - though unfunny. I was there as a part of a school CCA trip, and I was there with Mr. Thodey and some of my friends. It was a refreshing experience, though I remember very little about the place. Going back yesterday, then, became a blast from the past, as I revisited that place all over again. 

One thing that I didn't know was how 156 veered off Upper Thomson Road and off the road to Lornie Road. That also meant that our bus stopped opposite the orchards, which also meant that I was very lost. Unless the Mediacorp people were shooting some show that involves a thousand pots of plants, there was no way that that was the set of some show being filmed. It just rained at that time, the clouds were passing overhead, and the grounds were moist and the puddles dotted the tarmac streets like little pools of mirrors. We jumped the puddles and ran away to the side of the roads with every passing cars, all the while trying to figure out how to get to Mediacorp. There were signs here and there, all with big blue words that pointed in a certain direction that read "Reception". We followed the signs, and the journey on foot proved to be a dreadful one. It involved climbing up the slopes of Caldecott Hill, going pass rundown houses and empty mansions along the way, all the while braising ourselves for the evening heat that bore down on us ever so mercilessly. With every turn that had a Mediacorp sign, it led to even longer and lonelier roads, and we were beginning to wonder if Mediacorp was purposefully buried deep in a housing estate because it is really some top secret government fortress. I suppose it isn't difficult to imagine, with all the satellite dishes and stuff sticking out from the rooftops when we arrived a whole fifteen minutes of walking later. 

It was fun to spot celebrities in the cars as they drove by, though we didn't know their names for the most part. We saw a woman, and we called her "That Woman", since we have no idea who she is or what she does. We made up a song along the way, and it goes "I don't know what I've been told/Houses here are very old/Mediacorp is fucking far/I wish that I had a car". Exhaustion does get to the better of somebody, but we finally reached the doorstep of Mediacorp and welcomed the air-conditioned reception area with opened arms, literally. We sat there and watched lame Indian shows as it played over the wall of television, that had four shows playing at the same time. All of them were muted, so we started to dub the strange dances and the singing. I must say, Timiru is an awesome show, and everybody should try to catch it. It involves a kungfu doctor and a twisted love story which only Neptina understood. We celebrated our treacherous journey by eating the other chocolate bar, and that was when my friends started to come in. We took pictures at the reception area like excited tourists, and the crowd gathered slowly, a bunch of people of different ages. Someone came out and ushered us through narrow corridors and walkways, down staircases and through the parking lot, which I remember so well from my last trip. The smell of the studio attacked our nostrils as we approached the doorway, and the flickering lights from within exploded out from inside like a gateway to some silent party. 

The studio was smaller than I thought, and I suppose that is the way it is in studios for the most part. The amazing part about television is that it could fool anybody, even the size of the studio seemed manipulated with the magic of camera angles. Anyway, we were asked to sit at the right hand side of the studio (left hand side on television), and we were asked to fill up three wooden steps while others filled up the other end of the stage and the front. The lights were being tested, the band came in and start preparing, and the emcee of the night (Johnny, as pictured) started to get the crowd warmed up. That is what they usually do anyway, to have this guy warm up the crowd and give us a briefing on what is going to happen. It's funny how, with a recorded show, everything can be edited later on in the editing room. We had to record excited reactions and disappointed reactions based on the situation before the show even started, which was kind of silly to begin with. Still, it was a rather interesting experience all around. We had to imagine that the imaginary contestant just won half a million dollars, and we had to cheer as loud as we can and go as crazy as possible. Then we had to imagine all his money dropping down to just ten thousand dollars, and we had to look really disappointed. Keep in mind that all of this happened before the actual taping started. 

Then the celebrities started to arrive, and apparently it was a sitcom special. Adrian Pang stood in as the temporary host as Gurmit Singh went off to dress up as his famous persona - PCK. Michelle Cheong was there as well, as well as the police from Police & Thief, who oddly reminds me of Isbandi. This is what you would see in the show: a contestant goes up onto the stage, he picks a category off the screen and he has to pick one of the two songs. He then has to come up with the words in the missing lyrics in order to move on to the next level of cash price. The top prize is half a million dollars, and there are more and more words as you move along. In actual fact, this is what happened. The contestant would pick a song, go rehearse the song briefly with the band, rehearse with the audience once or twice, then the actual taping begins. Of course, any blunders during the actual taping would have to be reshot, and that was why the entire taping took up nearly four hours for a one hour show. I have no idea how those people does it, but I suppose it is a rewarding job, though however lowly paid they are. I must say that Mediacorp pulled it off pretty well, though, despite the obvious lack of funding. The stage looked flimsy, the lights looked a little cheap, but it all worked somehow. So, kudos to the crew. 

The night went on with a lot of singing, a lot of partying, a lot of screaming and a lot of shouting. I started a chant because I wanted them to sing YMCA instead of the other song in the category, which I cannot remember. Other than that, I have to mention the design of Mediacorp, which is a giant maze made to confuse even the smartest lab rat and the tastiest cookie at the end of that maze. There was a toilet break halfway through the recording, and the guys followed a crew member to the male restroom which was vaguely directed at with arrows printed on A4 sized paper. We probably went through ten turns and an equal amount of narrow hallways before we reached the female restroom. Yes, Nicholas, Jun Rong, myself and the crewman ended up at the female restroom in the corner of nowhere. We hesitated for a while when he disappeared through the door, and we followed suit. It was lucky enough for Nicholas and I to have got out of the restroom fast enough, because apparently a group of females came right after we left - it would have become a very awkward situation. Anyway, we went back into the studio and did a whole bunch of singing, dancing, and we actually did Macarena on television. We also did YMCA on television, and I went wild with Ghostbusters. Seriously, it was a whole lot of fun, even if the process took forever. 

The recording started at about 7.45, and it ended at half past eleven. We all went our separate ways for the most part, and the night was getting late by the time we breathe the moist air outside the broadcast center. The stars hung low in the cloudless skies, and the sounds of cars were distant and faraway. Neptina and I chose the long road home, back from where we came and through the creepy neighborhood all over again. Cars passed us by like cars along a long highway in the desert, and we were like lost travelers trying to hitch a ride. There was a time when, amidst the sound of mating bull frogs and crickets, we stared up into the sky to see my favorite constellation all over again. We sang Yellow as we trotted down the hill and pass the creepy houses all over again, which looked even more creepy at night. It was a great day that ended off nicely in the cab ride home - who doesn't like a car ride in the middle of the night with no traffic anyway? Thanks guys, for the beautiful Sunday and an eye-opening experience. Do remember to catch Don't Forget the Lyrics on Channel 5, starting from 27th of November! And, somebody please tape the show. I know I will regret seeing myself dance the Macarena on television but, tape it anyway.