I was twelve when I went to my first concert. Me, my brother, and our friend, Mikey, went to see Tiffany at Kingswood Music Theater at Canada's Wonderland.

Kingswood was an open air amphitheater; we sat on the lawn way in the back. At this time, I didn't know who Tiffany was, exactly. I was just excited to be within a thirty second sprint of someone famous.

I thought this concert was a bit of a rip off. First of all, we didn't have seats, unless you call a semi-flat patch of grass a seat.

Secondly, the concert was late getting started, which I thought was incredibly unprofessional.

And thirdly, we were at a Tiffany concert! So why was Tiffany not taking the stage? Instead, it was five guys who kind of half-strutted, half-danced to their spots, then began going through heavily choreographed dance routines (insofar as stepping around the stage in unison could be considered "dancing"; we did as much in the folk dancing segment of gym class) while singing one pop song after another.

They talked to the audience, sang a bit, then talked some more. After the third or fourth song, I said to Mikey, "What the heck's going on? Where's Tiffany?"

"She should be on after these guys," he replied. "This is just the opening act."

"Is that how it works?" I wondered aloud. It was disagreeable to hardcore Tiffany fans (of which I wasn't one), but marketing-wise, it made sense. I felt terribly mature for being able to see the Big Picture.

"They look gay," my brother said. He was almost ten at this time. I wasn't sure if he knew what it meant to be gay.

But nevertheless, I agreed with him. "Their songs are too cliché. They'll never get anywhere."

"I dunno, girls seem to like them," Mikey said. He flipped open his program.

"Who are they?" I asked.

"Some group from Boston," he said. "They even have a stupid name too: New Kids on the Block."

-/-

The Six Pack was the second last act of the talent show. Previously, there’d been dancers, a magician, a guy who did stand-up comedy, a couple of solo singers, and a kung-fu guy who whipped around a pair of nunchucks. For most of the show, the Bruce Lee wannabe looked to be in the lead.

Until the Six Pack came out with Albert leading the bassline of "Stand By Me" and Rupert and Peter alternating the opening verses. At the chorus, they paused then all six of them picked up the song in full harmony, their voices coming thickly out of the speakers like a choir of twice as many guys.

The audience exploded into wild cheering, started by the Joes' two girlfriends from Group B who were sitting a few seats down from me in my row. I got goosebumps.

I imagined myself up there, but with Rupert and Elton instead of the Six Pack. They'd be tearing it up, Rupe killing a keyboard and Elton playing his guitar so hard that his fingers would bleed. I, of course, would be contentedly hiding in the back singing my doo-wop and bee-bop and whatever else, and deftly dodging flying panties meant for my groupmates.

My theory was, with any group, there's always that one guy that fans remember last, if at all. For instance, 90% of people, when asked to recall the Beatles, will name George Harrison last. Often, they'll forget poor George altogether. This was all I aspired to be: George Harrison.

Well okay, given my lack of actual talent, maybe being Danny or Jonathan from New Kids would've been more realistic. Or I could be the fat, ugly guy from NSync. I don't even know that dude's name, but he's just as rich as the rest of them and that was all I wanted.

After the initial burst, the audience quieted down until the second song, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", where, as planned, Rupe blasted his falsetto and held it. (The amps didn't explode.) Then he riffed upwards as was becoming his M.O. and the crowd cheered again, this time without any prompting from the Joes' girls. I sat still in my seat, daydreaming. The Six Pack was pretty good. Luis was probably their weakest link, but he at least had the propriety to stay in the background.

By the time they started "In the Still of the Night", the audience was about all cheered out and was getting restless. This was where the stripping thing became a stroke of genius, because after a couple of rehearsals with small test audiences consisting of our roommates and girls around campus that Luis was trying to impress, the Six Pack found that keeping the energy level up throughout their set would be a challenge. So instead of stripping at the end, Luis arranged short solos for everyone, at the ends of which, they'd remove a piece of clothing.

To get the crowd's attention, Peter and Albert stepped up and sang the first verse, then TORE OFF the tight, flimsy t-shirts they were wearing (doctored with strategic cuts under the arms), and threw the scraps of fabric at a small cluster of girls whom I identified to be friends of theirs. Their muscles twitched enthusiastically and these chicks duly screamed their pretty Californian heads off. Pandemonium ensued.

Then came Luis and Rupert. (Rupe got cheers before he took his shirt off, further convincing me that riding his and Elton's coattails would be a good career move and a fast ride that'd break all kinds of speeding laws.)

Lastly, it was the Joes, both of whose IQs were greater than their body weights.

Harvard Joe was wearing a windbreaker—crimson, of course. After his solo, he took this off and threw it at his girlfriend (presumably for safe-keeping; he wasn't the type to wantonly cast away his belongings), revealing a t-shirt that read "Yale Sucks!" in a mock-up of Yale's school crest. The Harvard people cheered while the Yale people booed lustily. (There was an intimidatingly high population of both at Love Boat.)

Following Harvard Joe, Yale Joe sang his solo while pulling off his belt. When he was done, he dropped his pants altogether and kicked them offstage. He was wearing boxers that proclaimed that, "Harvard Sucks!" The cheers and jeers among the crowd reversed polarity.

With everybody now naked in part and in degrees, the Six Pack came together in harmony and finished off the song to a rousing ovation.

I clapped as loudly as I could, thinking, "Show business, man! That's what I'm getting into!"

-/-

Four weeks into Love Boat, we left the Chien Tan campus for a two week bus tour of Taiwan. They called this the "Trip South", after which the camp would be adjourned and most of us would go home.

The weekend before the Trip South, me and Rupe went with Elton to round three of the Ark contest. (Rupert had gotten disqualified after round two for singing the same song that he'd performed for round one. We didn't know that this was in the rules, but apparently everybody else did. Oh well.)

"How many rounds are there?" I asked.

"Six or seven, I think?" Elton replied uncertainly. "I'm not sure."

"Shit, it's a good thing I got booted early then," Rupe said. "I wouldn't have been able to stay anyway."

"Hey, speaking of getting booted, how'd your talent show thing go?" Elton asked.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, suddenly indignant. "They should've won!"

"Hm? They didn't?"

"No, these breakdancers that came on last did. There were three of them, two guys and a girl and the girl wore a bikini top."

"Oh, that's rough," Elton said. "What was the prize?"

"Not much," Rupert answered. "Just t-shirts."

"I'm telling you, man," I said, "you guys would've won, except they didn't have six t-shirts to give out, that's why those breakdancers got first. It was just a matter of face for the judges. It was such bullshit."

Rupert shrugged. "Doesn't matter. The last thing we needed was for Luis's head to get bigger."

Elton laughed. "Getting stood up by that chick didn't knock him down a few pegs?"

"Nah," I replied. "Officially, no one knows. So he's been carrying on like he scored."

"The Joes considered busting him when he was kind of flirting with their girlfriends after rehearsals once, but I talked them out of it," Rupe said.

I snorted back a chuckle. "Yeah, I was there. Yale Joe was pretty pissed. Actually, I was hoping they WOULD out him. It would've been funny."

"It would've wrecked our performance."

"Not to mention it would've been mean-spirited," Elton added.

Rupe smirked. "Well, I think we cared more about the group than Luis's delicate sensibilities."

Elton grinned and shook his head.

"So you're staying in Taiwan until the contest over, Elton?" I asked.

"Yeah, I guess. If I get the hook early, I'll probably go with my grandma to Hong Kong for a short trip or something. You know, knock on wood." He rapped the tabletop with his knuckles.

"Dude, we've got to keep in touch," Rupert said. He got out a pen and scribbled his address on the back of a flyer that someone had left on our table before the third round started. "I don't know what my school address will be yet, but that's my house. Send me a postcard or something, my parents will forward it to me."

After Rupe was done, I took his pen and the flyer and wrote down my address too. "I'm staying home and commuting to school, so yeah, likewise, a postcard or whatever would be cool."

Elton looked at me and Rupert's addresses to make sure he could read them. I gave him Rupe's pen and he wrote down two lines of letters and punctuation at the bottom of the flyer, tore them off and gave Rupert and I each a piece.

I read the gibberish on my slip of paper, scowled, and took a peek at Rupe's piece, which was, of course, the same nonsense repeated: a bunch of letters, followed by three numbers, a little "a" inside a squiggle, then more letters separated by the occasional period.

"Uh, what's this?" I asked uncertainly. I felt like I should've already known the answer to my question.

"It's my email address," Elton replied, grinning. "We're the first year that's getting them."

"Cool," I breathed. "Um... what's 'email'?"

...tbc.