Compiled by Russell Lee and his team of Ghost Writers.
KARAOKE TO DIE FOR
Johnson Tan, 24, salesman
We always go to the same karaoke lounge, off one of the lorongs in Geylang. The girls are very pretty and their gangster friends are showing off the whole night.
My friends and I are salesmen. Maybe this is
as close to living dangerously as we will ever get!
And my friend, Cedric Chew Ah Teck, knows this
little house in the back lane where the mamasan
gives him a special deal.
When we went there one night, the place was
almost deserted. Just the mamasan and her girls,
and an old man. We'd heard him sing before.
Ai-yoh, low-yah!
He had a squeaky voice and he always ran out of breath half-way through the song.
Very painful.
We ordered our drinks and the girl Cedric
liked was rubbing up against him. We felt pretty good... until the old man got up to sing.
"Oh no," we groaned.
Sure enough, he staggered up to the micro-
phone and called out for Number 66.
The next minute we heard the beginning of
the song that everyone tries to sing: "My Way".
The old man must have been very drunk. He
flopped down onto a stool, loosened his tie, and
launched into the opening line.
"And now, the end is near..."
But instead of his usual terrible voice, he
sounded different. The hair stood on the back of
my neck. I blinked. I couldn't believe what I was
hearing.
I swear, it was the voice of Frank Sinatra
coming out of the old drunk's mouth!
Everyone in the bar had stopped talking. We
just stared at the singer.
"I took the blows...!"
Sinatra's voice sang on and on. The old man
was sweating. His face had grown grey. He was
standing now, one arm outstretched just like Sinatra when he sings.
"I did it my... way... "
As the song ended, we all stood up and
clapped. We had never experienced anything like
it. And as we cheered, the old man's eyes blinked
once, then he fell forward, onto the floor.
He didn't move. We rushed over, rolling him
onto his back. But it was too late. He was icy cold.
He was dead!
The mamasan threw a sheet over the still figure on the floor. She closed the bar and we went
home, whispering to each other about what we'd
seen and heard.
I reached home feeling very disturbed. I
flicked on the television and froze. The announcer
was interrupting the programme with a news
flash.
"Frank Sinatra died tonight in Los Angeles at
the age of 82..."
My skin was tingling with fear. That old man
had certainly sounded like Sinatra. Had the
singer's spirit possessed him, just for one more
rendition of "My Way", before it passed into the
next world?
And then, when I woke in the morning, I saw
a short story in the paper.
"An 82-year-old man collapsed and died in a
karaoke lounge in Geylang last night. He was
identified as Mr Frank Sin."
Russell Lee: Frank Sin had to go... but did he do it
his way or was it Sinatra's way? By the way, Damien Sin
wants to make it clear that Frank is no relation of his.
Before I had left Singapore for an American university, Russell, I read some of your books. I didn't believe any of it!
So, Russell, I hope you'll forgive me, because
something happened in New York that really
changed my mind.
Some friends and I had gone to New York for
the weekend. We went out drinking on the Saturday night. At around midnight, my friends said they were tired and they left me alone in a bar on
the Lower West Side.
I don't know if you've been to New York, but
that part of town can be very dangerous. The
streets are very dark, lined with old warehouses,
the kind of area where trouble looks for you.
When I stumbled out of the bar into the wind-
swept, deserted street; it must have been one
o'clock in the morning. There were no taxis. After
