A Bad Memory

For some reason, today I was reminded about one of my worst memories. I was a second year in KMB and I was picked along with a few others from my class to do a "talent presentation" in front of the whole class as part of our Malay internal assessment. Naturally, when this happened, I tried to worm myself out but to no avail. The teacher was telling each of us what type of presentation she would like e.g. reading a Sajak, Puisi, Pantun and singing. To my horror, I was told to sing about Blanche from "A Streetcar Named Desire". I knew it was coming to me before she even said it. I knew it wasn't random selection. If there was anyone my teacher would've picked to sing, it would be me. I don't know why, but I am convinced of it!

So I went home and reluctantly chose some song by Artie Shaw to sing to. And after much whining to everyone who would listen, I wrote my lyrics and practiced singing in my head over and over again. My laptop speakers were too soft so I decided to use Shafiq's laptop, which had Harman Kardon speakers which were much louder.

The morning came and I woke up with much trepidation and dragged my feet to class. I remember distinctly that Malay was the first period of the day. Some of my other unlucky classmates were reading poems and I remember Aishah was as unfortunate as me to be chosen to sing. After everyone was done, my turn finally came so I went to the back of the class and prepared the laptop and loaded the song. My heart was like a bird fluttering wildly in my chest. All eyes were on me. I cranked up the volume to the max and played the track. To my dismay, it was so soft even on Shafiq's laptop. It was like a tiny whisper in the background. This was of course, appalling because that would mean that everyone would be hearing my voice without any background music to drown it down. I stood there like a statue. Everyone was looking and I just felt mortally embarrassed. My teacher wouldn't back down and kept asking me to start before the period ended and so I finally started singing (after restarting the track for the umpteenth time). My mouth was so dry from the adrenaline and so my voice was so raspy and scratchy. I couldn't really hold any notes and for the whole time, I thought (or wished) that I would just collapse so the whole thing would end. The song felt like it would never end. My voice was getting progressively worse and my chest felt like it was going to burst open.

As all things do, it eventually came to an end. All eyes were fixed on me because no one knew where else to look, and there was pin-drop silence. I knew that they were very uncomfortable and not knowing what to do. I'm sure it was also horrifying for them to have witnessed such torture. Someone started clapping and so everyone did too, out of politeness. Still wishing that I would somehow collapse or disappear, I slowly made my way back to my desk at the front of the class, where the teacher was standing. She looked at me with much disappointment and said "that wasn't too bad was it? You're not dead?" I just smiled back and thought to myself, "yes it was THAT bad and I'd much rather have stripped in front of the class!"