Chapter 52 - Critical Virality of Theater Drama

The next morning, just as usual, Tayaw woke up early at 2 in the morning feeling refreshed as if he did not just have a busy night. The strange room and bed confused him at first but after a split second of regaining the memories of all that happened the previous day, his mind was cleared again.

He heard the gentle breathing beside him and looked at the sleeping Alexandra, lying on her side facing him, some of her limbs exposed uncovered by the blanket they shared. He observed her for a little and basked in the pride of spending a night with such gorgeous woman.

His face couldn't help but feel hot when he recalled how proactive she was the previous night in bed. She was so unlike Arianne, Tayaw's ex-girlfriend in his previous life who was just a plank in bed.

He never imagined indulging in a one night stand this early, and in a foreign land at that. Perhaps it's because of his newfound blessings, freedom, and obsession with music that his libido was almost non-existent ever since he came back in time.

Having enough of lying down, Tayaw finally got out of the bed, and covered up Alexandra with the blanket. He threw on himself the bathrobe and went to look for his personal phone. He couldn't help but raise his eyebrows as he saw the number of notifications on his Facebook app.

It turned out that the band is still awake and some of the members sent him separate personal messages throughout the past few hours. "Tayaw! Check out the video of our Monna Park performance!" Ike's message said which was sent just a few minutes ago. Similar messages are also sent by the other members.

Tayaw, despite already having an inkling of the reason of the band's excitement, also could not help but anticipate. He quickly sat himself down to his hotel suite's sofa and opened his laptop to check the band's YouTube channel.

The channel currently has 46 videos. The latest uploads were the two-hour long video of the band's full performance at Monna Park last week, and then 30 other separate videos cut from it, based on the 30 songs they played.

The full performance video, despite only being seven days since its upload, has the most views amongst all the channel's videos. It currently has 539,000 views, which in 2011, is a huge deal for a video that recent. Their other videos prior to the busking videos also benefited from their busking video's popularity and had all crossed 200,000 views. Before their busking, the views of these videos are only in the single digit thousands.

He couldn't help but slam his fist on the sofa's hand rest out of excitement. Tayaw intentionally chose a place like Monna Park for the busking to promote their band to younger people. College kids and young artists are more active in the internet so Tayaw figured that if these young people loved his band's performance, they are more likely to share it to others in social media. Looking at the numbers, Tayaw's plan not only worked, it worked too well.

He then opened his iTunes and Stoppify accounts to see how well his album, '18' is doing. Looking at the numbers gave him a pleasant surprise. In iTunes, his album sold 2,000 and the singles separately sold more in average which has earned him around a total of 18,000 BGC.

In Stoppify, each of his songs were streamed an average of 5,400 times which earned his account 450BGC. This is the difference between people purchasing songs in iTunes and people streaming for free in Stoppify. This is why Tayaw found it a shame in his previous life when iTunes, Google Play Music, and other music platforms that sell songs and albums to music fans stopped selling and adapted Stoppify's streaming style. It's great for music listeners, but bad news for artists.

Looking at the numbers gave him great satisfaction. For an unknown artist like him, selling thousands of digital copies is still more than a good start. He's still not sure if the sales of his songs and YouTube views contribute to his Roulette View Points, but he'd be glad if it does.

Quickly calculating the time, Tayaw figured it's only around 7pm in Ouigab so he called Inson, who always spend his time on his laptop, through Skype. During the video call, Tayaw and the band talked about how they are going to be popular soon and that they are going on TV soon, to Tayaw's amus.e.m.e.nt.

Tayaw also bragged about the band's internet popularity being a result of his careful planning, to the band's awe. The band also grabbed the opportunity to ask Tayaw to buy them something good in New York which they will pay back when Tayaw returns to Ouigab. The band also expressed their confidence in their grades their pre-term because they just finished the last of their pre-term exams this week.

After an hour of chatting, Tayaw finally bid goodbye and ended the video call. Looking at the time, he figured it's still 8pm in Okuba so he contacted his parents next and talked to them and his brothers for the next two hours. He was not able to talk to his parents yesterday morning because when Tayaw arrived at the airport, it was already past midnight in Teungeb. He also was not able to call his parents the previous night because they were busy at work, and he was also busy doing the nasty.

Tayaw ended the call just in time to see Alexandra who just woke up, roll around the bed and stretched.

"Good morning Miss Garcia." Tayaw greeted Alexandra. "Hey. I was confused when I heard a foreign language half-asleep. I forgot English isn't your language." Alexandra replied as she sat up on the bed, covering herself with the blanket. "hmm. I was just bragging to my friends how I spent the night with a beautiful lawyer. Teenage boys love that stuff." Tayaw joked.

Alexandra's face froze at the possible meaning of what Tayaw said. "… You didn't take…" Alexandra barely said. "HEY! I was joking! I was just talking to my parents." Tayaw said in defense against whatever Alexandra is implying that he did. "Ohh. Thank goodness. I thought you sent n.a.k.e.d pictures of me to your friends." Alexandra said in relief.

It was Tayaw's turn to have his face freeze. "Good lord, why would I even do that?" Tayaw said in slight indignation. "uhuh. What time is it?" Alexandra asked as she got out of the bed, covering herself with the blanket to pick up her phone from the bedside table.

"Quarter past five. What's with the sudden shyness? It's not like I haven't seen everythin already." Tayaw said in amus.e.m.e.nt at Alexandra's actions. Alexandra rolled her eyes. "Well, it was appropriate last night. Unless…" Alexandra said, smirking in insinuation.

Two hours later, Alexandra sank back in the bed, sweating in exhaustion. "… You know *pant*, I don't think *pant* I can *pant* be satisfied *pant* by anyone else *pant* ever again *pant*." Alexandra said catching her breath. Tayaw also lay back down beside her to cool down. "Well, I'll take that as a compliment. However, I think it's difficult for me to find someone who can keep up with me without injuring themselves." Tayaw replied. Tayaw was actually being nice. Although Alexandra has incredible stamina, it wasn't enough for Tayaw to fully relieve himself. He actually had to pump himself last night after Alexandra fell asleep to neutralize his dingdong.

"That somehow hurts my pride." Alexandra scoffed as she fell back asleep. Tayaw on the other hand, got back up and went to the shower. After showering and dressing himself in business casual attire, he left Alexandra a note on the bedside table. He then grabbed his laptop, phone, and wallet and went out to explore the city by himself.

After an early lunch, he found himself in Central Park. Central Park isn't actually that impressive to him: wide lawns, some structures, some lakes/ponds and fountains, nothing new really. He however, is curious to see the world famous Delorac Theater.

Luckily for him, he wasn't too late arriving as he received one of the last tickets given away by the theater people. There are a lot of theater houses in Teungeb but the dramas in Teungeb are not as good and not as matured as American, British, French, and German plays.

Delorac Theater, though, is public open-air theater known for the performances of old English plays that can be watched by anyone for free. "Mycetes the Great" as written on the ticket, is a play written in 1588 by the famous English playwright Kit Harlowe. Harlowe based the play on the real historic figure Mycetes, a 15th century Persian shepherd who found his talents as a warlord and climbed his way to establish his own powerful kingdom.

Tayaw is not actually a great fan of plays, but he finds old classics like 'Mycetes the Great' very interesting. This is his first time seeing an old classic, but from the videos of plays he has seen, he feels like he's being transformed in time and immerse himself in the culture of the time the play was written.

Tayaw found himself a seat in the audience and the play finally started. Mycetes, the main character, started a dialogue with Xenocrates, his philosopher friend.

"Come, lady, let not this appall your thoughts;

The jewels and the treasure we have ta'en

Shall be reserv'd, and you in better state

Than if you were arriv'd in Syria,

Even in the circle of your father's arms,

The mighty Soldan of Aegyptia."

The vocal resonance and phonetic clarity in the delivery of the lines by the actors really displays their theater training. The exaggerated body language, however, kind of distracted him a bit. He's not sure if it's because he saw the movies he received from the roulette many times, but the body language of the actors looks very unnatural in comparison. He guessed it can't be helped because they had to do it for the audiences in the back could see, but it still took away the immersion of the experience.

Still, he enjoyed the performance very much. It urged him to make a decision to spend the next few days to watch all drama plays and musicals all over Broadway in the next few days.