Friday:
We met up with a friend for a night of river cruising on the Thames. His friend and some buddies of his throw an annual boat cruise for charity. Ingenious, really. The weather was being typically British on land but by the time we hopped aboard the London Belle at Millenium Pier, we were dry and looking forward to the fully stocked bar.
On board, the crowd was a heavy mix of people: French, Italians, South Africans and...New Yorkers! Ashamedly, R and I spent a good portion of the night playing the comparison game between New York and London with a group of party goers. We reminisced about American customer service and discussed the sixth season of Sopranos...how could they leave us hanging like that??? The highlight of the evening was when we passed our new flat (a post to come soon) on the Chelsea Embankment and sighed in great relief knowing we'd be leaving Bayswater soon! Rave: London is gorgeous by night.
After the cruise and many cheap liquor cocktails later, it was revealed that the party raised significant wads of British Sterling for Water Aid. Drinking for charity = good. Our altruistic selves headed off to Crazy Larry's on the King's Road in Chelsea.
Hmm... Crazy Larry's. Crazy, yes. But, it's definitely not the place I would normally go to if given a sober choice. This place has an identity crisis; it's not quite a lounge , club, or bar, but a mixture of the three. CL's has the most ridiculous playlist ranging from typical Eurotrash house music to Salt 'n Peppa's "Push It" and M.C. Hammer's "You Can't Touch This". Nonetheless, we were still reeling from the boat cruise vibes and new friends partied on into the night.
Saturday:
Saturday got off to a great start. We stayed in the whole day from the previous night's festivities and rallied ourselves off the couch (a challenging task at the time) to get ready for dinner and dancing later on at Pacha.
Dinner was wonderful at Cous Cous Darna in South Kensington. I had the seafood pastilla and the starters were fresh. I especially liked the aubergine salad and the warm bread rolls. Yum! And, because no meal is really complete without some belly dancing, we were all pleasantly entertained by the CCD's lone female dancer.
We met up with a friend for a night of river cruising on the Thames. His friend and some buddies of his throw an annual boat cruise for charity. Ingenious, really. The weather was being typically British on land but by the time we hopped aboard the London Belle at Millenium Pier, we were dry and looking forward to the fully stocked bar.
On board, the crowd was a heavy mix of people: French, Italians, South Africans and...New Yorkers! Ashamedly, R and I spent a good portion of the night playing the comparison game between New York and London with a group of party goers. We reminisced about American customer service and discussed the sixth season of Sopranos...how could they leave us hanging like that??? The highlight of the evening was when we passed our new flat (a post to come soon) on the Chelsea Embankment and sighed in great relief knowing we'd be leaving Bayswater soon! Rave: London is gorgeous by night.After the cruise and many cheap liquor cocktails later, it was revealed that the party raised significant wads of British Sterling for Water Aid. Drinking for charity = good. Our altruistic selves headed off to Crazy Larry's on the King's Road in Chelsea.
Hmm... Crazy Larry's. Crazy, yes. But, it's definitely not the place I would normally go to if given a sober choice. This place has an identity crisis; it's not quite a lounge , club, or bar, but a mixture of the three. CL's has the most ridiculous playlist ranging from typical Eurotrash house music to Salt 'n Peppa's "Push It" and M.C. Hammer's "You Can't Touch This". Nonetheless, we were still reeling from the boat cruise vibes and new friends partied on into the night.
Saturday:
Saturday got off to a great start. We stayed in the whole day from the previous night's festivities and rallied ourselves off the couch (a challenging task at the time) to get ready for dinner and dancing later on at Pacha.
Dinner was wonderful at Cous Cous Darna in South Kensington. I had the seafood pastilla and the starters were fresh. I especially liked the aubergine salad and the warm bread rolls. Yum! And, because no meal is really complete without some belly dancing, we were all pleasantly entertained by the CCD's lone female dancer.
Post dinner, it was off for some dancing at Pacha for their Hed Kandi nigh
t. Hed Kandi is a record label that promotes the good life with music. Think beach, tan bodies, beautiful people, and Ibiza. The great thing about Pacha is that it saves any unfinished bottles for your next visit so we welcomed an old bottle of Vodka and Jack with open arms and began our dancing for the night.
t. Hed Kandi is a record label that promotes the good life with music. Think beach, tan bodies, beautiful people, and Ibiza. The great thing about Pacha is that it saves any unfinished bottles for your next visit so we welcomed an old bottle of Vodka and Jack with open arms and began our dancing for the night. Everyone was having a great time and while I would like to offer my seal of endorsement to Pacha, we were met with some unfortunate lack of hospitality. A friend was a few drinks deep when 2 steroid popping wannabes (a.k.a. bouncers) carried him off and threw him out the back entrance. It happened so quickly that none of us had time to react. Before we knew it, we were in a full fledged battle to a) figured out what had just happened and b) get our friend back. Our friend had done nothing wrong and the club's desire to resolve this "problem" was with a disproportionate use of force. The management was completely unprofessional and could not give us the names of the security nor would they let us exit out the same back entrance our friend had been pushed from by security. It was completely ridiculous and we vowed never to return.
Luckily, our friend was safe and we headed off to the police station to figure out what we could do. Was this normal? Who do these people think they are? Our late night trip to the station made me question my own safety here in London considering the conclusion that there was really nothing we could do as tax-paying citizens except to just allow these goon heads to "do their job" and pick on their V.I.P. customers. Overall, it was just unfair.
We learned:
1. When you enter a club, you are on private property and therefore, the management can kick out any person for any reason using force. (WHAT?)
2. The only way we could voice our complaints was with the Westminster council (think governing body for each London borough) and there would be a "full investigation". (My thought is that this investigation wouldn't be so thorough and yield little results.)
3. As the average citizen in this city, the laws aren't designed to necessarily protect you and don't make sense. Be careful!
We had some much deserved McDonald's french fries and headed back home well after the London sun had risen and a new day had begun.
1 comment:
Hey Rebekah,
That reminds me of a time when I yelled at a bouncer that he was being overzealous when he was kicking out a co-worker of mine, claiming he was drunk. (he was acting strange, I think he may have had aspergers, but he was not drunk) The bouncer yelled back, "Who are you calling overzealous". And I thought, do you even know what that word means, but instead I said "You are being overzealous", because how often do you get to use that word?
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