Party Pooped

The event aiming to be the World’s Longest Dance Party, spanning 55 hours, was a shocker. Ever since school days, I have advocated the noble cause of Delhi’s nightlife, vigorously protesting the capital’s going to sleep by 11—now I can confidently tell those who think along the same lines that they have no idea what lurks on the other side.

I didn’t have to walk in at witching hour to find myself among a bunch of loonies at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. I didn’t even have to search to spot them.

On Sunday afternoon—48 hours post-party commencement—the 400-strong crowd was still raring to go. To a song that the deejay must have dug out from an ancient Divya Bharti steaming numbers archive.

I was in class VI when Saat Samunder Paar Main Tere Peeche Peeche Aa Gayee was released. No matter where they managed to remix its remains from, there was no excuse for the mania that struck everybody when the song began to play. Three in the afternoon on a hot sticky Sunday. Whatever happened to siesta?

Sunday night—when the party neared closure—saw me trapped in a huge enclosure where invitees riding on energy drink Cult’s caffeine-induced high caught hold of me.

Party foam—wet, white, soapy—wasn’t something I’d bargained for, I thought, as my floaters bled into the snow. I actually ended up dancing on one of those horrendous numbers. My only source of consolation is that I forget which.

To be honest, headbanging is the only musical expression my rock-loyal self has ever been comfortable with. Since I’m accommodating, I completely got the 42 couples dancing on stage to beat Cleveland’s Guinness Book of World Record’s target of 52 hours and three minutes.

But before I reached vantage point from where I could glimpse those feebly moving 84 arms—and carefully avoiding any leg movement—I couldn’t help but wonder where the voluntary crowd was coming from.

The stream of vehicles pouring into the parking lot let loose all kinds—newly-weds, girlfriends dragging in their reluctant better halves, parents chaperoning daughters, and hordes of boys.

Walking into the wooden-floored makeshift hall, I saw groups of boys—some flexible, others more driven—showing off elaborate break-dance rituals to friends and onlookers—in homage to Prabhudeva.

Jostled to the rope divider between performer and commoner, I found myself besides a suspiciously happy-looking Delhi cop, tapping his feet to Pink’s Get The Party Started.

I gleaned from a yellow-shirted, curly haired youth from Afghanistan that the black-and-silver girl had been at the party for six hours and despite rigorous efforts, hadn’t managed to land a prize. “Look at mine,’’ he preened, caressing a grubby scrap of chart paper, which allowed him four free pints of beer from Modern Bazaar, Vasant Vihar.

Just about then, a Freddy Mercuryship of sorts struck the auntyji nearby. For the past half hour, her furrowed eyebrows and scowls at black-and-silver had left little doubt about her views on the party. So nobody quite expected it when she suddenly threw off her handbag and jumped in the fray.

Black-and-silver’s partner was elbowed into obscurity as auntyji shook the floor. Her chit of a daughter, attired in a black T-shirt, screaming “Yes, honey” joined in, to her credit. Surprisingly, most kids who turned up with their parents were proud of their presence.

And while the dancing may have lacked elan, there was a certain prudish modesty about it. Like when the roar of voices and bodies thrown up in the air for Chhaiya Chhaiya died down as soon as the deejay moved into Would You Go To Bed With Me?

Marketing consultancy Idea Stream’s attempt to make it to the Guinness Book of World Records may have required them to hire dancers to set the record.

And while partying may have come closer to tedium for those dancers, for those who partook temporarily of the mind-boggling variety of music, Delhi finally did have a nightlife—even if it was for two days.

The less said about it, though, the better.