Where’s the party tonight?

MUMBAI: If you woke up with a hangover, muscular pain and a vivid memory of embarrassing stories from last night’s five-star party, congratulations. You have just lived every young boy’s annual dream. A dream that, for 19-year-old Rishi Arora—and many many teenagers like him —entails weeks of careful application of that all-important Indian quality known as jugaad.
Last year, when Rishi decided to tap into his usual ATM called ‘Dad’ for party passes, his father showed him the door by likening the price of a pass to the EMI of a house. Unwilling to let go, Rishi devised a smart plan: two weeks before New Year’s Eve, he began hanging around the party venue, sharing a cup of tea with a hulky man and exchanging high-fives and man jokes with him. In this new ‘friendship’ with the bouncer of the nightclub, Rishi found his ticket to high society, free drinks and more importantly, bragging rights of a night well spent. “There were TV stars, people coming in Mercedes and drinking expensive whisky,” he would later show off to friends.
The desperation created by the immense hype around New Year’s Eve leads many youngsters to behave in similarly bizarre ways. Twenty-four-year-old Shikha Krishnan, for instance, went to the extent of befriending a “friend’s friend’s friend” at a wedding ceremony last year after she realised that the latter owned a bungalow in Vasai and was known to throw elaborate new year bashes. Market forces at this time of year—when all advertising copy begins with the refrain ‘It’s that time of the year again’—conspire to cause even cash-strapped collegians to believe that they need to be seen at the right mwah-mwah glitzy evening in order to validate their existence. That’s why “to be able to afford the tickets, which are usually between Rs 8,000 and Rs 20,000 each, they bet, play snooker and even go to the extent of trying to gatecrash or waiting till the last minute to see if they get lucky”, says event manager Dhawal Oza of Dreamz, Events and Ideas.
Some enterprising collegians, in fact, try to sneak into nightclubs with fake stamps on their forearms.
“They try to replicate the entry stamp by transferring it on to a friend while the ink is still fresh, but we can figure out as the imprint is either dull or in reverse,” says Vikram Mehta, director of Red Om Entertainment, who organises high-profile New Year parties. If fake stamps don’t work, there’s always false self-esteem.
“Gatecrashers are very confident people. You see them at almost every New Year party. They are well-dressed, well-spoken, uninhibited and of course, uninvited,” says Meghana Chitalia, head of event management agency Party Planet. It is small wonder then that at one private party being organised this year, the invitations include swipe cards.
Party planners are also full of stories about teenagers who tie up with them and sell party passes in the hope of receiving a hefty commission while some others volunteer to don ridiculous costumes in malls to earn a quick buck. Psychologist Seema Hingorrany, who always sees a spurt in the number of “depressed and lonely” cases around this time, knows of a boy who went one step further.
“He sold off his mother’s ornaments to be able to afford passes for himself and his new girlfriend. “He didn’t want to go Dutch and even bought gifts for her. It was when they were about to call the cops that he admitted to it,” Hingorrany recalls. A 23-year-old swears that some youngsters go even further, hooking up with drug dealers to get them easy customers and make their pile.
For those who don’t scam their way through, there’s the annual heartbreak. Hardeep Singh rues that it’s the hardest to be a young, single male on this day.
“Bouncers prefer it if you are with a girl but if I don’t get in, how will I find one?” he asks. He must know, however, that it isn’t the best day to be a young woman either. The urge to live up to social expectations at such parties leads to a lot of feminine heartburn. Thane’s Jasmin Mani, who normally spends New Year’s eve cribbing about how she doesn’t have a social circle, grudgingly went on a hunt for an evening gown recently. “Even though I have not been invited to any party and despite the fact that it makes me feel conscious and fat, I bought it,” she says. “I want to be prepared.”
Geetika Khapse can understand. She has been dreaming of wearing the WR01—a Wendell Rodricks dress that costs Rs 8,600—for months.
“I need to have it for New Year’s eve but I cannot pay this much,” says Khapse, who is considering going to a wardrobe rental service called Secret Wardrobe that boasts an enviable collection of A-list designers like Abraham & Thakore, Sabyasachi, Rohit Bal and Maheka Mirpuri. Secret Wardrobe, which keeps its clients’ identity strictly under wraps, gets rentals everyday, especially in this season, says owner Jessica G Nagpal.
For these young Mumbaikars, if the world is ending in 2012, every desperate measure seems reasonable.