That time when I spent an epic night searching for karaoke in Montreal

Posted on February 13, 2019 by H-Bomb

The Notre-Dame Basilica (Basilique Notre-Dame de Montréal) has nothing to do with its namesake cathedral in Paris to which it bears a slight resemblance. It is, however, a beautiful and historically significant house of worship in its own right.

This post will differ from most others on this blog, in that it’s more in the style of a memoir telling a story – a story involving events that occurred all the way back in August 2010. I was making a weekend visit to Montreal, partly because I was interested to see that city for the first time but also partly because I had (to that point) sung in 17 countries and I felt it was about time that I karaoked in Canada. In fact, upon arriving at Montreal’s Pierre Trudeau International Airport, I joyfully declared to the immigration agent that the purpose of my trip was to add Canada to my World Karaoke Tour. 🙂 (He seemed a little confused, but allowed me to enter the country.) So this story is about whether, that weekend, I would succeed in my quest to karaoke in Canada for the first time.

By the time I got checked into my hotel in Montreal, it was late on Friday night (about 11 pm) and I was too tired to go out. So I took it easy. While I thought about looking for karaoke immediately, I decided that I could wait one more night for my initial singing appearance in the land of maple leaves. But would that initial appearance end up happening?

Pre-karaoke sightseeing

On Saturday, I started the day by riding the Metro to Old Montreal (Vieux-Montréal), a historic district with some buildings dating back to the city’s early days in the 17th century. My first stop in Old Montreal was the Notre-Dame basilica, a beautiful church that looks a little like its Parisian namesake (although the two churches have nothing to do with each other). I wanted to have a look at the interior, but during that afternoon it was closed to the public because several weddings were being held inside. However, an employee told me that a son et lumière (sound and light) show was being offered inside the church in the evening. I bought a ticket for the 7 pm show; since the show was to last about 35 minutes, it would let out early enough to still allow me plenty of time to make it to karaoke later on that night. Continue reading →

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Country no. 55 on my World Karaoke Tour: this time, I had the luck of the Irish

Posted on February 4, 2019 by H-Bomb

Me with a friend at the Guinness Storehouse, where I learned how Ireland’s most celebrated beer brand is brewed and then enjoyed a complimentary pint.

Sometimes when I make my first foray to a country, I don’t find an opportunity to karaoke there. On rare occasions, I’ve even been known to travel to a country twice without managing to add it to my World Karaoke Tour. That occurred with Italy, where I finally sang (in Rome) on my 3rd visit to that country in November 2015; and it was also the case with Czechia (formerly known as the Czech Republic), where I finally sang (in Prague) during my 3rd journey to that country in September 2017.

As of mid-February 2018, another nation for which my initial 2 journeys to it had proved karaokeless was Ireland. For the background of how I got to that point, see this post. So that month, during the long weekend that the U.S. celebrates as Presidents Day weekend, I returned to Ireland’s capital city for the sole purpose of performing karaoke there!

Daytime in Dublin: a classic beer and a classic book

During the daytime hours of my latest sojourn in Dublin, I kept myself busy, focusing on a couple of attractions that appealed to my passions for history, culture, and general knowledge. First, I toured the Guinness Storehouse, a massive facility adjacent to the St. James’s Gate brewery (the largest brewery of Guinness stouts). The Storehouse presents the history of the beer brand that dates back to 1759, and also explains comprehensively the processes involved in the production of the company’s beverages. Included in the price of admission is the opportunity to enjoy a pint of one of those beverages, on the house – an opportunity of which I naturally took advantage.

Also on my agenda for Exploring Dublin v. 3.0 was the Book of Kells. That tome is an illuminated manuscript crafted circa 800 A.D. in a Scottish monastery and containing the texts of all four New Testament Gospels. Originally 680 pages long, it’s been split into 4 sections (one for each Gospel), 2 of which are on public display at any one time in an exhibition at Dublin’s Trinity College – where the Book of Kells has resided since the 1650s. (Trinity College – whose official name is the “College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin” – is itself quite historic, having been founded in 1592.)

Some classic examples of Guinness advertising, on display in the Guinness Storehouse.

Continue reading →

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Hawaii 5-0: I’ve now karaoked in every U.S. state! (plus Washington, DC)

Posted on January 27, 2019 by H-Bomb

Me enjoying a Mai Tai at a restaurant in the Waikīkī section of Honolulu.

Since 1959, the U.S. has consisted of 50 states; in that year, Alaska and Hawai’i became the most recent jurisdictions to gain statehood. Just visiting all 50 of the states in the sprawling nation that I call home is a mammoth undertaking. In the final hours of 2018, I completed my project of karaokeing in all 50 of those states (as well as the national capital city of Washington, DC, which does not itself belong to any state).

For a more detailed background on the quest that I was pursuing, see my prior posts recounting my karaoke appearances throughout the U.S. in 2016, 2017, and the earlier part of 2018. Between July 2016 and July 2018, the number of states in which I’d karaoked increased from 20 to 49. That left only one state to check off: the archipelago of Hawai’i. I felt it was fitting that the 50th state to join the U.S. would become the 50th state on my American Karaoke Tour.

Blue Hawaii: saving the best for last

Geographically, Hawai’i differs greatly from any other state in the U.S. Consisting principally of 8 main islands (7 of which are inhabited), its territory also includes numerous additional islands, islets, atolls, and reefs. Did you know that Hawai’i is actually composed of 137 total islands of various sizes? Those islands, stretching from Hawai’i (often called the “Big Island”) in the southeast to the Kure Atoll in the northwest, extend for roughly 1,500 miles. But you only ever hear about the octet of main islands — such as Oahu, home to the state’s capital city of Honolulu.

That capital city lies over 2,500 miles southwest of Los Angeles. The Hawaiian state is located in the Tropics, the zone between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. In fact, the main Hawaiian island chain forms one of the corners of the Polynesian triangle. (That triangle’s other vertices are Easter Island and New Zealand.) Such an exotic setting seemed the perfect locale for the culmination of my American Karaoke Tour.

This image shows the complete Hawaiian archipelago.

My first stop in Hawai’i was the island of Oahu. Continue reading →

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On the brink of history: I’ve karaoked in 49 states, and no. 50 is imminent!

Posted on December 25, 2018 by H-Bomb

While transferring at Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport en route to Fargo, North Dakota, I spotted the best luggage tag ever.

Since 1959, the U.S. has consisted of 50 states. This Saturday night, in Honolulu, Hawai’i, I’ll complete the achievement of having karaoked in all 50!

As recounted here, in 2017 I made great strides in my American Karaoke Tour (the domestic subset of my World Karaoke Tour). By year’s end, the number of U.S. states in which I’ve karaoked had soared from 28 to 42! Thus far in 2018, I’ve karaoked in 7 of the remaining 8 states – bringing my total to 49, with only Hawai’i remaining to be checked off. This is the story of how I got to 49 during the present calendar year. This post also covers a trio of new-to-me cities, in states that I’d previously karaoked in, in which I sang in 2018

One introductory note: for two of the states covered in this post, I lack karaoke videos to share with you. In early July, I discovered that at some point during the preceding few weeks, Facebook had deleted eight of my karaoke videos, without prior or subsequent notice to me and without explanation. All eight of the videos had originated as live Facebook video transmissions which I then saved to the “Timeline” on my Facebook page. (Four were originally broadcast from locations in the U.S., including cities in two of my “new states” that are discussed below; and the other quartet were originally broadcast from various European cities.) There was no valid reason for the removal of any of the videos, which were fully compliant with Facebook’s community standards. (If any record companies had objected to any of the videos on the grounds that the musical content – i.e., the underlying song – was copyrighted, Facebook’s written guidelines provide that I should have been given the opportunity to address such objections. But I was never notified of a challenge to a single one of the videos in question – which, notably, don’t generate revenue for me – and my complaints to Facebook were met with silence.) Moreover, because the deleted videos all originated as live transmissions rather than having originally been recorded as MP4 files, I didn’t have backups of them, so I’ve lost the priceless memories that the videos represent. (I’ve subsequently downloaded copies of all my remaining karaoke videos that are housed on Mark Zuckerberg’s site.) But you don’t care about any of this, because it’s not like you were even going to watch all 9 of the surviving videos that did make it into this post. 😀 So let’s talk about travel and karaoke!

1. Little Rock, Arkansas (March 2018)

In early March I travelled to Little Rock, the Arkansan capital. Former U.S. President Bill Clinton was from Arkansas, and he chose to build his Presidential library in Little Rock. Touring that library was high on my agenda for that city. While the facility contains copious historical information, my favourite feature was its exact replica of the White House’s Oval Office.

Me in the replica of the Oval Office at the William J. Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock.

Karaoke in Little Rock

• Venue: Khalil’s Pub

• First song: “Just Can’t Get Enough” (originally recorded by Depeche Mode)

My song selection in Little Rock had nothing to do with that city or Arkansas. Continue reading →

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Country no. 50 on my World Karaoke Tour: a night of Malta

Posted on December 20, 2018 by H-Bomb

Me with a Maltese falcon at a falconry centre on the island of Malta.

Yes, I’ve been sadly derelict in keeping this blog up-to-date. As I dispatch this post into the interwebs, the tally of countries in which I’ve karaoked stands at 59. There’s work to be done to catch you, my loyal readers, up on my adventures. That work starts now, as I reminisce about a trip that took place in July 2017. Prince Harry was still over four months away from proposing to Meghan Markle when that trip took place.

To reach the half-century mark for countries in which I’ve karaoked, I wanted to choose somewhere special. The nation that I settled upon was the Mediterranean archipelago of Malta. That tiny but picturesque and history-rich country turned out to be a spectacular selection. Malta was like nowhere else that I’ve been to. And in addition to enjoying an idyllic vacation there, I did reach the milestone of 50 countries on my World Karaoke Tour.

Introduction: the geography and history

Placing Malta in space and time

Malta consists of three inhabited islands – Malta, Gozo, and Comino (rendered in Maltese as “Kemmuna”), in descending order of size; and a smattering of unpopulated isles. I lodged on the island of Malta and also day-tripped via ferry to Gozo. The archipelago is situated in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, some 100 miles south of Sicily and just over 300 miles north of the African nation of Tunisia.

A map depicting Malta’s three populated islands.

As with many locales in and around the Mediterranean, history on the islands that comprise Malta goes way back. Continue reading →

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Singing my way through North America, 2017 edition: how I karaoked in 14 new U.S. states (plus another part of Canada)

Posted on February 26, 2018 by H-Bomb

Selfie in front of Warren Buffett’s house in Omaha, Nebraska in September 2017.

As detailed in this post, in 2016 I continued to place a high value on international travel but added a new focus on seeing more of my own country, the United States – with the ultimate goal of visiting, and karaokeing in, all 50 of its states. Henceforth, I shall refer to that 50-state karaoke project as my American Karaoke Tour – the domestic counterpart to my World Karaoke Tour.

In 2017, I took a great leap forward towards completing my American Karaoke Tour. As the world rang in 2017, the tally of U.S. states on that tour stood at 28. Before the year was out, that number would climb all the way to 42. Plus I made some return singing appearances in a couple of additional states in which I’d sung in the past; and I explored a Canadian city that was new to me, thereby experiencing (and karaokeing in) a new Canadian province!

I realize that this blog post is exceedingly long, even though my recaps of particular destinations are quite condensed. Don’t feel overwhelmed; if you’re reluctant to slog through the whole thing, no one could blame you. 🙂 Just scroll down and read about the locations that most grab your fancy. Nor do I expect that you would have the time to view anywhere near all 19 of the karaoke videos that are embedded herein, even if you wanted to; but I do hope you’ll play at least a small sampling of them, to get a feel for what my North American singing experiences were like as I crisscrossed the continent in 2017. If you want suggestions, I can tell you that my own favourite videos in this blog post are of my performances of “Walking in Memphis” (which I sang in Vancouver, British Columbia); “Rock Lobster” (which I sang in Portland, Maine); “Wonderwall” (which I sang in Salt Lake City, Utah); and “Blister in the Sun” (which is the second video that you’ll find in the section on Des Moines, Iowa).

1. Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada (February 2017)

During the long President’s Day weekend that my home country observes in mid-February, I made my first visit to the Canadian province of British Columbia – and specifically, to the city of Vancouver. It didn’t take me long to fall in love with Vancouver, as so many travellers from all over the world have.

The Capilano Suspension Bridge in Vancouver is a rickety span that hangs 230 feet above the water below. Residents and tourists alike visit the park where it’s located, just for the opportunity to traverse it.

Vancouver is an intriguing amalgamation that combines a colourful history, quirky local institutions, and profuse outdoor recreational opportunities. In that latter quality, it resembles the nearby U.S metropolises of Seattle, Washington and Portland, Oregon – both of which are also situated in the region commonly dubbed the Pacific Northwest. (An additional commonality of Vancouver, Seattle, and Portland is that they’re prone to being periodically shaken by powerful earthquakes, due to their presence in the Cascadia Subduction Zone; but if you were to avoid all seismically hazardous locales, you’d be left with a lot fewer cool places to travel to. 🙂 ) Also similar to Seattle and Portland, Vancouver receives abundant rainfall during certain parts of the year. For example, don’t go to Vancouver in the month of February, as I did; that’s one of its soggiest months, and Vancouver got soaked throughout the long weekend of my jaunt there. Continue reading →

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Country no. 49 on my World Karaoke Tour: avoiding the wrath of Genghis Khan in Mongolia

Posted on February 11, 2018 by H-Bomb

Me in front of the equestrian statue of Genghis Khan, about 34 miles outside of Ulaanbaatar.

Not every mass-murderer gets an international airport named after him. But Genghis Khan wasn’t a run-of-the-mill genocidal dictator. He was a larger-than-life figure whose massive empire was the precursor to modern-day Mongolia, and who’s therefore regarded by Mongolians as kind of a founding father of their country and accorded commensurate respect. The fact that tens of millions of people died as a direct result of his commands – some as casualties in wars that were fought in his name, and some being outright murdered in extermination campaigns that he initiated – doesn’t detract from the esteem in which he’s held in Mongolia today.

In June 2017, I visited Mongolia’s capital, Ulanabaatar, as well as a couple of areas outside the city. As well, I sought to make Mongolia the 49th country on my World Karaoke Tour, after singing in Nepal and Bhutan during the preceding week and a half. Here’s the story of how my visit went.

Background: a little bit about Genghis Khan

Initially, it must be noted that Genghis Khan – or Chinggis Khaan, as Mongolians refer to him – was not the actual name of the medieval warlord who led the Mongol hordes; that moniker is an honorific meaning “Supreme Ruler.” When he entered this world in 1162, his birth name was Temujin. Although, I have to admit that “Temujin” doesn’t sound nearly as badass as Genghis Khan. 🙂

Regardless of what you call him, Genghis has his defenders and was admittedly a complicated figure. In recent years, some historians have attempted to rehabilitate his image, seeking to contextualize the massive body count that resulted from his policies. For example, this video hails him as a unifier of rival clans. It also asserts that many of the cities that Genghis destroyed only met that fate when they rebelled after surrendering to him – as if their refusal to meekly submit to a warlord’s conquest could justify such wholesale slaughter. As you might have guessed, I don’t go along with the revisionist whitewashing of Genghis’s legacy. In my view, notwithstanding the purported justifications for his conduct, Genghis ranks on a short list of the most brutal and murderous people in history. And that doesn’t even include the melee he incited in a southern California shopping mall in the late 20th century. 🙂

Yet in May 2017, to enter Mongolia, I flew into an airport that proudly bears his name. I mean, what’s next? Pol Pot International Airport in Cambodia? Josef Stalin International Airport in Russia? Adolf Hitler International Airport in Germany? Vlad the Impaler International Airport in Romania?

The airport that serves as the main gateway to Mongolia is named after one of history’s most prolific mass-murderers.

Continue reading →

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Countries no. 47 and 48 on my World Karaoke Tour: H-Bomb in the Himalayas, in Nepal and Bhutan

Posted on January 24, 2018 by H-Bomb

Me in front of the Tiger’s Nest Monastery in Paro district, Bhutan.

I sang “Katmandu” in Kathmandu. And I’m excited to be able to say that. However, of the pair of songs that share the name of the city, I kind of wish I’d gone with the other one.

So how did I come to find myself in Kathmandu, the Nepalese capital? Well, I was alighting there on my way to Bhutan, during an excursion to Asia in May 2017. Kathmandu is merely one of several cities from which you can fly to Bhutan’s international airport, which is in the town of Paro; but if Kathmandu is your point of departure, your flight path will include a segment during which you can enjoy a view of Mount Everest from above. So I availed myself of that flight option, reasoning that it might be the only time I would ever glimpse Everest from any altitude.

Monkeying around in Nepal

Now, Kathmandu itself is not the easiest of metropolises to reach — at least if you’re coming from North America. My itinerary was as follows: from my home base of New York City I flew to Beijing (which I had visited, and karaoked in, about a year earlier), and then after a couple of days there I proceeded to Bangkok. From Bangkok, I winged my way to Kathmandu.

A scene adjacent to the tarmac at Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport.

Prior to my arrival, my preconceived vision of Kathmandu was of an exotic and mystical city, although admittedly I knew little about the place. When I got there, I found the streets to be dirty and dusty, and the traffic chaotic. I wasn’t a fan. Maybe I didn’t give Kathmandu enough of a chance; I’m not saying I wouldn’t return there if the opportunity arose. But it didn’t make a stellar first impression on me.

Incidentally, although Nepal contains some of the highest points on the planet (such as Everest — which straddles Nepal’s border with Tibet — as well as other portions of the Himalayan range), Kathmandu is situated in a valley called Nepal Mandala, and its elevation is a relatively pedestrian 4,600 or so feet. So I didn’t need to carry an oxygen mask around with me in Kathmandu. 🙂 Nor did I need to worry about falling prey to the altitude sickness that I succumbed to in Cusco, Peru in 2013. Continue reading →

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Country no. 51 on my World Karaoke Tour: a Bohemian rhapsody in Prague

Posted on October 22, 2017 by H-Bomb

A view of Prague’s Old Town Square (Staroměstské náměstí).

I’ve fallen a little behind — okay, a lot behind — in updating this blog to keep pace with my international karaoke appearances. Prior to this post, my last blog entry chronicled my karaokeing in Dubai that occurred all the way back in January — which, at the time, brought the tally of countries on my World Karaoke Tour to 46. Since then, the Earth has completed a large portion of a revolution around the sun, and my country count has increased to 51.

Part of the reason for my recent quietness on the writing front is that I’ve been travelling much more often on weekends. Most of those weekend excursions have taken me to various parts of my home country, the United States, as I pursue the accomplishment of karaokeing in all 50 U.S. states. That’s an accomplishment to which I’m well on the way; as of this writing, I’ve been to 40 of those 50 states, and karaoked in all 40 of them. (I’ll recount all of my 2017 domestic travels in a post to be published in late February, 2018.) But since weekends have traditionally been my most productive part of the week for writing, my “50 states of karaoke” project has contributed to the slackening off of the pace of new posts appearing here at H-Bomb’s Worldwide Karaoke.

With my excuses out of the way, it’s way past time to catch up on telling the story of my 2017 karaoke travels. Although my last post discussed the 46th country, I’m now going to jump ahead to the 51st country, Czechia. Then, in the coming weeks, I’ll circle back to cover the 47th through 50th countries in which I performed. (Incidentally, when I speak of “Czechia,” I’m referring to the country that until 2016 was known to English speakers as the Czech Republic, but which then re-branded itself. Technically, the official name of the country remains “Czech Republic,” but “Czechia” is its intended name for everyday usage — in much the same way as, for example, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg is commonly called “Luxembourg.”) Continue reading →

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Country no. 46 on my World Karaoke Tour: everything is bigger in Dubai

Posted on June 22, 2017 by H-Bomb

This is a cheesy souvenir photo I purchased on the 124th floor of the Burj Khalifa. It was taken in front of a green screen, and the background was then superimposed.

Rising over one-half mile into the Dubai sky, the Burj Khalifa is currently the world’s tallest building, a superlative it’s claimed since 2008. (Sources disagree on the precise extent of the Burj Khalifa’s verticality; depending on which website you ask, its height is either 2,717 feet or 2,722 feet. Regardless, it’s fair to say that this particular edifice is damn tall.) At this writing, an even more skyscraping building, imaginatively dubbed The Tower, is under construction across town in Dubai, and is slated to be finished in 2020. The elevation at which The Tower will top out has not yet been determined, but is expected to exceed that of the Burj Khalifa. Both the Burj Khalifa and The Tower, however, will be dwarfed by the Jeddah Tower in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia — also on target for completion in 2020 — which is planned to ultimately soar to 3,307 feet above ground level. That’s a full kilometer!

While Dubai stands to lose the distinction of possessing the loftiest man-made structure on the planet, it will remain an embarrassment of riches for urban architecture geeks like me. In recent decades the city’s skyline has experienced explosive growth, to the point where Dubai now ranks third among all world cities in number of skyscrapers (defined as buildings at least 150 meters, or 490 feet, in height); as of this writing, Dubai boasts no fewer than 173 skyscrapers. (The two cities with even more skyscrapers than Dubai are Hong Kong and New York City.)

Architecture: new and old

A pair of stratospheric erections (Get your mind out of the gutter; I’m using the word “erection” as a synonym for “building”)

Obviously, the Burj Khalifa is — for now — the signature landmark not just of Dubai, but of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the nation to which that city belongs. Soaring above the many other skyscrapers of Dubai (at least until The Tower surpasses it), the Burj Khalifa is visible from points throughout the sprawling metropolis. Continue reading →

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Country no. 45 on my World Karaoke Tour: increasing my Q-rating in Qatar

Posted on May 8, 2017 by H-Bomb

On Doha’s waterfront stands this statue of of Orry Oryx, a mascot who was created for the 2016 Asian Games (which were held in Doha). An oryx is a type of antelope.

What’s the correct way to pronounce “Qatar”? Prior to my brief visit to that tiny nation on the Arabian peninsula, I’d been under the impression that the proper pronunciation was something approximating “Cutter.” But when I was aboard my Qatar Airways flight from Amman, Jordan to Doha, Qatar in January 2017, the narrator of the safety video that was played before takeoff pronounced the name of the airline as “Kah-TAHR Airways” — thus creating an uncertainty in my mind. So I chatted up a couple of the flight attendants to discuss this issue. Those FA’s, residents of the nation in question, agreed with their employer’s video and told me that they too recite the name of their homeland as “Kah-TAHR.” While internet research reveals a continued divide on this issue (see, for example, the results of this google search), I’ve adopted the pronunciation adhered to by Qatar’s flag airline — and by actual Qataris who work for that carrier.

Karaoke and sightseeing in Doha

Regardless of the right way to orally identify the world’s only country whose English name begins with the letter “Q,” I spent a couple of nights in that country — and specifically in its capital city of Doha — during the first week of this year. It was a brief pass-through, shamelessly tacked on to my itinerary in the hopes that I could add another country to my World Karaoke Tour. 🙂 Israel had become country no. 44 on that tour in the waning days of 2016; and after I failed to find karaoke during an otherwise spectacular sojourn in Jordan, it was my aspiration that Kah-TAHR or Cutter (as you prefer) would earn the distinction of becoming the 45th country in which I’d karaoked. Continue reading →

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I was jonesing to see Petra. Indiana Jonesing, that is.

Posted on March 30, 2017 by H-Bomb

Me in front of the Monastery (Al-Deir) at Petra.

Prelude: the day and night before

The longest ride

On the first day of 2017, a taxi ferried me from Jordan’s capital city of Amman to Petra. You may wonder why I’d arranged for a taxi to cover the approximately 150 mile driving distance between Amman and Petra, when an inexpensive bus serves the same route. Well, the only bus between the two cities that runs in the Petra-bound direction departs from Amman daily at 6:30 a.m. I’m so not a morning person, and waking up sufficiently early to catch a bus at 6:30 in the morning was a non-starter for me — particularly given that the night prior to my departure for Petra was New Year’s Eve, and I’d been up fairly late ringing in the new 12-month period. So I’d said ixnay to the bus and decided instead to embark on the longest taxi ride of my life. It wasn’t bad, though; I was treated to some pretty scenery along the way, and my taxi had free wi-fi! What could have been an at-times monotonous ride flew by with the help of my constant Facebooking and Instagramming. 🙂 Moreover, I became excited as we began to pass a series of road signs that marked the diminishing distance to my destination.

This sign informed me that only 20 kilometres now separated me from Petra!

Before I knew it, I was checking in to my hotel in Wadi Musa, a town nearby to the Petra archaeological site. Most of the area hotels are in Wadi Musa. Continue reading →

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Country no. 44 on my World Karaoke Tour: this year in Jerusalem!

Posted on March 12, 2017 by H-Bomb

I’m not sure why it took me so long to finally make it to Israel. Although I’m an atheist, I was raised Jewish, and the “land of milk and honey” is therefore my ancestral homeland. Plus, the country is a bonanza for a history buff like me. Some of the earliest civilisations in the world arose in areas that are now encompassed within Israel’s borders.

Jerusalem, the capital city, is renowned as one of the most beautiful metropolises in the world (and when I visited, Jerusalem didn’t disappoint in that regard). It also played significant roles in the formation of three major world religions, and is still regarded as sacred by those religions’ adherents. Anyway, I visited Israel for the first time in my life in December 2016. When I did, and the expectations that I’d formed over several decades were matched to reality, I was impressed by my experience.

Singing in Jerusalem

The historical and cultural aspects of my initial sojourn in Israel will be covered in a future post, as they deserve a fuller discussion. But we all know what’s most important for this blog when I’m reminiscing about a destination. 🙂 When I landed at Ben Gurion International Airport, I looked forward to adding Israel to my World Karaoke Tour. Just about a month earlier, Hungary had become the 43rd country in which I’d karaoked; and now I was eager to increase that country count once again! Continue reading →

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Country no. 43 on my World Karaoke tour: I’m Hungary for singing!

Posted on February 26, 2017 by H-Bomb

15179134_10154185271582198_7860121907890043812_n-1Budapest, the Hungarian capital, is a classic Eastern European city. Grand architecture; coffeehouses in abundance; and relics of the days when the city lay behind the Iron Curtain and under Soviet control. Budapest’s history, like that of so many European metropolises, harks back to Roman times; the Roman settlement was called Aquincum, and was itself preceded by a Celtic town whose inhabitants had dubbed it Ak-Ink (meaning “Ample Water”).

Adding to its allure, the modern incarnation of Budapest is bisected by the storied Danube River (the source of the “ample water” of which the Celts spoke); and that river — along with the Chain Bridge that spans it — make for some spectacular scenery. (The hilly area of Buda rises on one side of the Danube, while the Pest section is situated on the opposite side. In 1873, Buda and Pest, which had previously both been independent towns, merged to become the single magnificent city that we know today. True story.) During my first visit to Budapest, in November 2016, an additional attraction presented itself: Budapest is home to one of the Christmas markets that Europe is known for.

While I desired to thoroughly sample Budapest’s charms, there was one further, high-priority, item on my agenda when I descended upon that city. Since you know me, you know that it was inevitable that I would want to sing karaoke there. 🙂 Continue reading →

Categories: Europe, travel, World Karaoke Tour | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

A 2,200-year-old stone army and more: a brief visit to Xi’an, China

Posted on February 13, 2017 by H-Bomb

20160527_132453-01Maybe you can’t take it with you, but Qin Shi Huang (QSH) sure tried. The first emperor of a unified China, QSH directed the construction of thousands of terracotta warriors, assembled to protect him in the afterlife. This stone army — consisting of not only soldiers but also horses and even chariots — was interred with him in a vast necropolis when he departed from the mortal world in 210 or 209 B.C.

Eventually the burial site was lost to history, and it remained no more than the stuff of legend for over two millennia. Then, in 1974, QSH’s terracotta protection force was serendipitously discovered by a group of farmers who were digging for a well in what is today the city of Xi’an. The archaeological site has become a museum complex where you can explore some of the massive pits that have been unearthed, and view the terracotta fighting units arrayed therein.

When I made my first voyage to China in May 2016, an excursion to Xi’an was on the agenda, principally so that I could view the terracotta army — although Xi’an is actually a city of nearly 9 million inhabitants that offers a variety of attractions. Because I was there for one main reason, I hadn’t alotted much time for the city, and consequently I didn’t see very much of Xi’an’s other points of interest. Here’a an account of my activities during my two night stay. Continue reading →

Categories: Asia, travel | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 22 Comments

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