japanese kare-okay.

If you are ever in need of a boost of confidence, just ask Brian and I to go do karaoke with you. It's then that you will realize, that even though your life feels like it's falling apart-- at least you can find a pitch and a rhythm and maybe even a beat. But me and my husband? Not a chance. Separately, we are bad. Together, we are somewhere between terrible and atrocious. But man, do we LOVE to sing.

Oh, our children, our poor poor children. But hey, at least we're fun. 

Anyways, japanese karaoke is the bomb. You get your own sound proof room with just you and your homies. All you can drink fountain soda. And all the songs you could ever want to sing on your own display monitor. It's amazing. 

Now, remember, we've only lived in Japan for a month and a half. These people that we were karaokeing with we had only known for about 3 weeks. We were still in a make it or break it stage in our friendships. So Brian and I really tried to hold back and play it cool for the first few songs, but we can't help it-- we love to sing and we sing horribly. Luckily, we are still friends with all of these people so we are guessing that they saw through our voices and into our hearts.

There's Brian, warming up the vocal chords. 

This is Brian trying to play it cool.. slight smile, kicked back, relaxing. 

But just look at the tension in his fingers, he can't hold back much longer. 

Yep, there he is. There's our guy. So much commitment in the facial expression. 

On his feet. 

And maybe trying to rap? (third picture on the right) 

And so proud of his performance (bottom picture).

 This is me and my friend Jenni. She is a real life singer. You can tell by the way she holds her mouth.

 Jenni: natural.

McKenzie:painful.

 Yep, and then Joel really went for it with the squat and fist pump.

 I felt really good about this Celine "It's All Coming Back to Me Now" performance. 

But my nostrils and my mouth, 

I can't handle it. 

At least my teeths are straight. 

This was me saying like "hey, let's take a fun picture together!" but no, no no. 

Can't stop him once he's started. 

Well, rest assured that if you come visit us in Japan we WILL take you karaokeying. It's a fun, fun time for all. Except for those that have to listen to me and my man sing. Which would be you.... Oh well.