![Nightlife [Confidential] Volume 1 - Ivan Boone's Lim](/cover_695671.jpg "Nightlife [Confidential] Volume 1 - Ivan Boone's Lim")
she’s getting these days.
So I said, “I cannot say exactly what it is that people like about going out. It could be to get drunk. It may be just be to hang out with friends. Or perhaps they like dancing, or live entertainment. It could also be a combination of all or a few of these.”
Auntie nodded quietly. She was back to being the mild-mannered person I had been so used to.
“Yup, I really cannot explain it satisfactorily, and you have to actually go out to see, feel, experience and enjoy it yourself to understand it. Would you like to join Cara and I when we are out on a weekend? I’m sure I can find a place where you and uncle can feel absolutely comfortable,” I offered.
“No lah!” she declined instantly, waving her hands in front of her. “You young people go and enjoy yourselves, I’ll stay home and watch TV.”
Auntie never brought up the matter of clubbing again.
Shortly after that episode, I invited a young friend of mine out. She responded, almost with contempt, “I don’t club.”
A straightforward “no” would very well have sufficed, but she said it as if going out post-sunset – in Sunny Singapore – was a bad and dangerous thing to do.
Now I’ve had friends who have led very balanced and somewhat interesting lives without ever having seen the inside of a nightspot. Their doctors tell me they are doing quite well, but here was a youngster who, perhaps on account of a religious persuasion (she once scowled when I said the inspiration for my long hair was from Western artistic depictions of her theological messiah and not the hippy culture of the 1960s as she had suggested), actually believed that going out was – *gasp* – evil.
The fact is, it could be – if you’re under 18 years of age. In which case it’s not just evil, it’s illegal too in our part of the world.
But back to the question of what people find interesting on a night out:
Aside from the evil, hedonistic indulgences such as drinking and smoking, getting out is a wonderful way to relax, particularly after a tough day at the office or an especially gruesome week of work.
You get to meet people you wouldn’t otherwise see during a normal day. And with the assistance of alcohol, you’d find yourself less inhibited so you would be more inclined to make new friends. Your chances at this endeavour improves, too, if the new friends you are attempting to make are suitably and similarly lubricated.
You would also be in better stead, with your inhibitions dissolved, to have deep and meaningful conversations with friends and people you enjoy hanging out with.
There’s also entertainment: Live music in various styles and languages, dance music in various sub-genres, comedy clubs with comedians who become funnier as you drink , and sports-themed bars where all you really need worry about is the score.
For youngsters, it seems a lot simpler – dress your best and head to your favourite club, get intoxicated and see where the night takes you.
Older folk, I’ve noticed, seem a lot more selective, though there are, of course, exceptions.
A dear friend of mine hangs out mainly at two places – one, a dingy hole in the wall whose main entertainment is a run-down television set showing music videos from a video-cassette player or a laser-disc player, while the other is a somewhat rustic pub in which he has some control of the music selection. He’s probably seen the same music videos played hundreds of times at the former but reacts with the enthusiasm of a teenage rock-music fan each time they come on. And at the latter, he would, between swigs of beer and whisky, occasionally click on the mouse of a laptop at the bar to select the next 10 or 20 songs. While he appears to have an aversion for big dance clubs, he seems perfectly at ease once he has a beer in his hand. And although what he finds entertaining may bore the tears out of someone like me, it functions more as a backdrop to the more important activity of hanging out with his friends.
Another friend, much older than the rock music fan, would head down to his neighbourhood locale early in the evening when he is off work the next day. He would soak in whatever entertainment is available, whether from a live act or a CD, play darts with whoever cares to join him at a game, and then stagger off after his sixth or seventh half-pint of beer, usually before midnight. He chuckles a lot during the night, never gets into any argument with anyone, and avoids contact with quarrelsome former colleagues, leaving the premise for an adjacent bar should he get whiff of the impending arrival of any such character.
Yet another, much older than the previous two and who doesn’t look a day older than 70, would find himself in the most intense clubs drinking as many as five times a week, often with different groups of people at each outing. He almost always has a smile on his face, either from the effects of the drink he has just consumed or simply the anticipation of one.
And finally there’s this one guy I know who would be most adventurous when it came to nightspots, going to the most fashionable clubs and quite often, really obscure bars. He would observe the decor of an establishment, get completely immersed in its entertainment, talk to as many people as he possibly can while there, and discuss these with me afterwards as if he were researching the nightlife.
Amazingly, he would sometimes do this while he was designated driver, whereupon he would refuse to touch a single drop of alcohol the entire night. Which goes to show that you don’t have to be completely inebriated, or even slightly intoxicated, to have a good night out. And it’s not that he doesn’t enjoy his drink: he loves a good whisky and a thoughtfully-prepared cocktail. Astonishingly, he isn’t even an old bloke who has drunk the contents of several bars dry in his lifetime – he is still only in his early 20s.
Aside from the entertainment and company, going out also affords you many sideshows, because the night somehow seems to have its own rules. This book details some of the many sideshows I’ve witnessed, which is often more interesting and definitely a lot more memorable than the actual entertainment programmed by the various outlets.
There are more than a thousand establishments in Singapore serving alcohol and offering various types of entertainment. There are so many things you can drink in a night – from beers and spirits to wines and cocktails. Even a soft drink, if getting drunk is not your thing.
If you haven’t yet embarked on that wonderful journey into the night, this book offers its recommendations, and stories from the bars so you’d know some of the things to expect. Drink what pleases you and go where you like, for there isn’t a good or a bad drink just as there isn’t really a good or bad place to go. I say this to my friends all the time: There isn’t a bad whisky – just a whisky you don’t particularly fancy, and one that you like very much. Nobody can prove conclusively that the whisky he likes is better than yours. The same goes for nightspots.
I hope you’ll find one that you truly like, for whatever reason best suits you, where you can enjoy your favourite tipple all night, whatever it is.
Cheers.
NO NEED TO BRING YOUR OWN
While clubs in Singapore, just like anywhere else in the world, maintain a discretionary policy as far as entry into their premises is concerned, they also reserve the right to check the contents of bags that are carried by patrons.
Which means, simply, it is entirely up to the establishment’s management to decide whether or not to let you into the club and that if they do, it is within their rights to open up your bag, not to check on the brand of makeup or condom you
