out in my headstraights by appointment only

In my early days of university (and when I was still on Facebook) I heard about a place called Time Cafe in Dubai. And the reason  I heard about it was one of my Facebook Friends – DJ Moe – was doing karaoke nights there every Friday. Having never done karaoke properly in my life – save for a few rounds of Singstar on my PS2 – I decided to trudge down to Time Cafe with a friend and check it out. Though my first foray into karaoke wasn’t as glam as I’d have liked it to be, I still had a really good time belting out tunes and then dancing my ass off until 3 am.

And so Time Cafe became a routine weekend hotspot for my friends and I, mostly because everytime I sang a song, I got free drinks which I pawned off to my friends. We met some regulars there too, and it was where I also first met the great @YafeiStyle and his enormous posse of friends. I celebrated my birthday there almost every year, and it was always an absolute blast. But as the years(!!) rolled by, some of our regulars visited less frequently, and newer faces showed up. Except these newer faces looked like they just took the training wheels off their bicycles.

Anyhoo, fast forward to today and I decided to host a karaoke tweetup for old time’s sake at Time Cafe. I hadn’t been to the place in quite a while, so obviously walking in I nearly got a heart attack. The place was filled with boys and girls who looked like they just jumped off a High School Musical poster. I swear that the average age in that place was about 20. At one point, the DJ announced “Okay, and we have another birthday tonight – Happy Birthday to Grace, who’s 21 today!” 21? Are you fucking kidding me? I’ve got condoms that are older than that!

The fashion was also unbearable to look at – boys in baseball caps and hoodies, and girls with HUGE handbags (that resembled body bags) and ridiculously short skirts. In fact it wasn’t a skirt, but more of a really wide belt (full credit for that comment goes to @KarenPendragon!) And when the karaoke was over and the DJ started mixing, what did these teenagers do on the dance floor? Absolutely nothing – they stood huddled in a circle while a few of them attempted to breakdance – sadly no one broke their necks. And the girls of course were trying to shake their ass and gyrate to impress the boys – one girl was tossing her hair like she was in a Sunsilk commercial and grinding against this guy like she was mining for gold…a truly WTF moment in the making.

So today I bid goodbye to Time Cafe – I certainly have some good memories of that place before their door policy went to shit, but it’s time to move on to pastures new. I certainly hope that these youngsters don’t stay up past their bed time!