Firetop

Last Thursday evening it was time to see if my party planning skills matched up to the task of organising the company Christmas do at Guanabara in London (Holborn). With over 300 attendees eating one of six different set menus over two sittings, plus multiple pre-paid drink vouchers to use for the rest of the evening, the administration alone was a major headache! However, the management at Guanabara were exceptionally efficient which made all the difference. I admit to being slightly concerned regarding the unquestioning attitude of the Guanabara staff during the preparations, but as my Brazilian colleague explained “only you British panic over small details�… and I think we were pretty well prepared ourselves anyway.

I opted for giving all 310 attendees a reversible coaster, one side featuring their main course selection, the other their choice of dessert. The coasters and drinks vouchers were all professionally designed and printed (by Suzie_Q). Guanabara staff were briefed in advance with samples and the process seemed to run smoothly; meals arrived on time and nobody was missed (to my knowledge), even special dietary requests were perfectly handled. It’s obviously very difficult to deliver two batches of 160 hot meals en-mass and keep a standard high enough to compete with a-la-carte selections from top London chefs. However, the meals generally were quite acceptable, they certainly did the job of filling stomachs in preparation for much drinking and dancing.

Musical entertainment was provided by DJs and a live band, both of which were preceded by some bare-chested Brazilian men performing ‘Capoeira Sul da Bahia’ which looked a lot like a non contact kick-boxing demonstration, or something that should feature as a BBC1 ‘ident’ (the 10-second clips that link TV shows). It is a dance-fight-game based upon a 16th century African slave excercise used for defending themselves against their Portuguese owners - today it lives on. The female attendees from the company seemed to very much appreciate these muscular acrobats - completely surrounding the edge of the circular dance floor to watch and show their appreciation at the back flips.

The live band played some fantastic rhythmic samba tunes that got the dance floor jumping to their flute and bongo drums. Later in the evening we were treated to the sound of Sambamuffin – Brazilian ‘hip-hop’ which had more appeal than what many of us would normally think of when hearing those two words. By the time it came to go home I had personally had my fill of Caparinhas and Mojitos, the only downside to the evening was trying to hail a cab outside at 2am – luckily the night buses to Victoria were pretty frequent and I was home by 4am (it was a long cab from Victoria!).

 

Technorati Tags: guanabara, brazillian club, Capoeira Sul da Bahia, sambamuffin

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