Monday, March 23, 2009
Harana
My Videoke
'Harana' is a Filipino word that means 'to serenade'. It is a Filipino folk tradition in which aspiring suitors attempt to woo a maiden by singing to her underneath her window. When I was single, my friends and I used to serenade the girls' dormitories in the university I worked for before. We usually do it on the first month of the semester and start at the freshmen students up to the seniors. It was fun. The funny thing was once we brought one of our friends who was more good looking than us (pardon my shameless admission of false pride), and when we started singing, the girls, who were shrieking, turned off all the lights in their rooms and used flashlights to check us out. The shrieking continued and we really thought that they liked our songs, but we realized that they were actually looking at this one good looking guy, and he was not even singing. We didn't invite him the next time. Come on, he didn't need that. I serenade not because I was trying to win somebody's heart (I had a girlfriend at that time) but we were usually invited by a friend's friends to help them with their crushes. We used to eat burgers after serenading (for free) and I guess that was the goal for me.
So why am I telling you this? It's because of this song, not the song popularized by Parokya Ni Edgar but a song that I once sang while my wife (a new acquaintance at that time) was around, you know, trying to impress her. I guess that helped. Enjoy!