Mirror Magazine

Mirror Magazine

Some people didn’t get to spend New Year’s Eve just the way they would have liked to
Not quite what I had in mind
By Vidushi Seneviratne and Aaysha Cader
It’s another New Year, and some people have celebrated it in style. Having partied all night (and into the morning), they’ve had the time of their lives, skipped work the next day and slept the whole morning. But not everyone has the perfect New Year’s Eve.

While the partying was in full swing, there were also those who were stuck in parking lots trying to gatecrash New Year’s eve dances, DJs behind the controls at parties and others in studios doing radio shows alone; there were lone policemen manning the roads; there were doctors on call; there were those who had to work the next morning.

For *Nishan (26) New Year meant Mass, and early to work for the office New Year gathering. On his way after work, seeing an acquaintance involved in one of those ‘New Year brawls’ in a shopping complex, he stopped to see what was up. The brawl had been bad, and police entries had to be made, “It was obviously not fun being at the police station on New Year’s day,” he says, adding that all departments at the station were functioning, and the cops didn’t seem to be having the day off. “After the police scenario, we had to accompany him to hospital,” says Nishan, adding that it took over two hours to get a simple injury attended to at the accident service, as so many cases were being brought in.

Making sure you get the best deal on New Year’s Eve is everyone’s priority. To get there, some people would do just about anything… even leaving the dance they’ve paid good money for… and gate crashing a more ‘rocking’ one.

*Chris (20) did just that and as a result spent the wee hours of the new year in a car park! “We just had to be there, since it was one of the more ‘happening’ parties in town, but getting in was a problem,” he says, adding that he and his friends had to try out numerous ploys before they were finally able to talk their way through. In order to ensure that their entry seemed less conspicuous, they had to make several calls, sweet-talk total strangers to try and get entry passes and hang around watching the reactions of the bouncers to fellow gate crashers, all of which resulted in spending a considerable time in the car park.

“In the end, we were such ‘pros’ at it, that we got an apology from the hotel staff for their ‘inhospitality’. It was risky, but on a day like that you are up for anything for fun,” grins Chris. Excitement apart, it’s amazing how many people would go through the hazardous procedure of getting in to a New Year’s dance ticketless.

With the non-stop partying, the New Year was also greeted with the usual rise in cases of drunken driving, and in the number of youth who passed out and had to be driven away in taxis. More policemen were also on duty; director, Traffic Administration and Road Safety, S.M. Wickrem-esinghe said that as many as 40 additional officers were deployed in Mount Lavinia with approximately 52 detections of drunken driving made in that area alone. For the New Year, over 500 additional police officers were deployed to man Colombo city, keeping law and order on the streets, while everyone else was partying the night away.

*Ash, 22, was at a party on New Year’s eve, but the hitch was that he didn’t know the crowd! “I had to spend the night and the next morning behind the DJ controls, playing music for top notch business people I didn’t know,” he says. “It was obviously not fun as I was doing a job,” says he, adding that he missed his friends, and there certainly was no ‘celebration’. As he generally parties through the night to greet the New Year, he found DJing at a private party all the more difficult to handle. “The party finished at 2.30 a.m. so I went home, watched TV and slept,” he says. He also had to make it to his workplace the next morning at 9.30 a.m.

Since January 1 this year was a weekday, most people had to put the previous night’s partying behind them and get to work. “I had to get to work by about 8.30 a.m. since I was handling the morning show,” says a DJ of a popular radio station whose first morning of 2004 was spent in a studio.

“That was one lousy shift. You practically have to drag your feet to work on a day like that. Once I was on air I felt like I was talking to myself since the chances of anyone being up so early that day were minute.” Apart from this, the first day of a New Year is given so much importance that messing up in any way would be totally disastrous. “Since it was the 1st, I knew I had to do a good job.”

So… starting the year with a ‘bang’, in the company of friends and family is what we’d all like to do, but not everyone gets to have that perfect moment. As for those who had work the next morning, had to gatecrash parties, or were stuck alone with people you didn’t know (or didn’t like), well, it must have been bad, and we agree that it’s certainly not the best way to start the New Year. On the other hand, you’ve said hello to 2004 in a ‘different’ way, cliché though it maybe...

Having said that, here’s an early reminder that the next New Year is just 354 days away, and you might want your top priority New Year resolution for this year to sound something like, “I WILL have fun when I greet 2005!” And you know what, you’ve got a whole year to plan for it!
* Names have been changed

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