Some people think that organised fun is a good thing. These people are wrong. One hideous event that I recently had the misfortune to learn of abundantly illustrates why.
The 'Big Night Out', organised by the Gold Coast Backpackers Association, is everything I hate about Going Out. (I must confess that I didn't actually go, so there is a small possibility that it might have been amazing. But I doubt it. As my friend Alessandro once said, 'I might be wrong, but I'm not.') On the face of it though, it's a fairly inoffensive pub crawl, sold to eager travelers as ‘the chance to party with your fellow backpackers on the most exclusive Backpacker’s Big Night Out in town!’ A reasonable sentence at first glance, perhaps, and maybe even an appealing one - if it wasn't a big, fat, stinking lie.
The Big Night Out is the antithesis of exclusivity. Surfers Paradise, where this extravaganza takes place, is a community that exists solely to service backpackers. If backpackers didn’t visit Surfers, it would be nothing more than a perfectly pleasant but completely anonymous hamlet on the Australian Gold Coast. Instead it is a bustling, mile-long stretch of high-rise hotels and tacky bars and restaurants. Backpackers made Surfers. Backpackers are Surfers. The Big Night Out is ‘exclusive' only in the sense that it is exclusively available to anyone willing to fork out the $30 attendance fee.
Amongst the things you get for this $30 is 'FREE VIP entry to four clubs'. My issues with this are twofold. Firstly, it's not free, because YOU HAVE TO PAY FOR IT. Secondly, VIP entry only provides a benefit if there is a qualification for admittance, some sort of, I don't know, EXCLUSIVITY. If everyone's the same, then there's absolutely no point. It takes 200 VIPs just as long to file into a building as it does 200 Ps. Idiots.
But some of the very worst things about the Big Night Out are those that the flyer doesn't flower up. Take the 'FREE group photo'. You know the kind: everyone strains to get to the centre of the picture, thrusting a drink in the air and forcing an open-mouthed grin in a desperate attempt to be memorable. They are completely charmless and totally naff. Look at you all! You sheep! You cretinous sheep! There you are with your stale, watery lager and your carefully unbuttoned Ben Sherman shirts and your whiter-than-thou trainers, doing your very best to have fun - or at least appear to be having fun - because you're supposed to. What a crock of shit.
Organised fun will never work because the pressure to achieve your collective aim of enjoyment makes it virtually impossible to relax. The best policy is to never, ever want to go out. That way, when you are occasionally persuaded to leave the comfort of your home for a bar or, God forbid, a night club, there is a small chance that it might be better than fucking awful.
Vincent Forrester
4 comments:
I think New Year's Eve is the greatest example of utterly contrived fun. Much like my abilities in the bedroom, I find lowering expectations before you set out is the only way you'll even approach having some fun on a night out.
Yup New Year's Eve is definitely a time when I have lived some of my lowest points. A particularly heinous one sometime circa the early millenium involved three boys alone,a sad attempt at garnering some guests (girls)to this non-existant 'house party', and finally three seperate piles of vomit and a grovelling morning spent apologising to parents. Bad times.
Hi, I am one of managers of the hostels and I have experienced the Backpackers Association Club Crawl and I find your blog or what ever you call it misleading and total unfounded. I find it hard for you to comment when you have not even experienced the event held on the Gold Coast. So your comments are a waste of time for travellers to read of even give a second glance at your blog. I thought bloggs were about the truth and what you personally experience not lies that you make up. Please give the human race some credit to make up their minds on how to spend their money and their time. If I was a guest on the Big Night Out and read your blogg I would think who is the idiot. I am sure you sit at home on your own making up stories to fill the empty void in your life which most of the human race call LIVING. Sorry you feel that lies and misrepresentation is all you could write I encourage you to get out and experience life, as we are here for a good time not a long time!!!
If that previous response is genuine then it's made my day.
Some superbly vitriolic soundbites there...
Post a Comment