Giles Brown
AS 2013 draws to a close, it’s a time for most people for reflection on the previous 12 months, see how many days they can last before breaking their resolutions and plan for the ‘biggest night of the year’ – New Year’s Eve.
With my, ahem, ‘colourful’ history on the Marbella social scene and general freebooter behaviour you might be surprised to learn that December 31 isn’t my favourite night.
From long and painful experience I’ve come to the conclusion that New Year’s Eve is for amateurs and I’m a professional.
Far too often NYE turns into a grim affair as people are determined to hace a great time. That’s all well and good but one of the great things about socialising in Spain is the spontanious nature off it all.
Some of my (admittedly dimly recalled) nights have been afternoon lunches on the beach that turn into impromptu celebrations and end with everybody at a private villa somewhere in the hills.
On NYE people tend to go into overdrive, getting stuck into the cheap cava with a vengeance with the normal and predicable results of tears before the clock strikes midnight as well as some truly awful dance moves – normally to “Blurred Lines”.
There’s also the small matter of trying to get home after your night of revelry. For reasons best known to themselves most Spanish taxi drivers seem to take the night off, and so the taxi ranks look somewhat like the American withdrawl from Vietnam – though you had a better chance of getting a chopper off the roof of the US embassy than a taxi out of Marbella on New Year’s Eve.
And in case you are wondering, I plan to see in 2014 up at the Casita in front of a roaring fire, a huge tub of Quality Street to dip into and boxed set of Game of Thrones on the DVD. And then take great pleasure in maliciously phoning up my friends who went out the night before in a Brian Hanrahan “I counted them all out and I counted them all back in again” style.
Happy New Year!!!
