The Price Of Partying Like It’s 1999

By Rupert Truscott-Hughes on January 29, 2015 in Other

Is it just me, or is the price of everything associated with New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day getting a little bit ridiculous? Sure, it’s the time of the year when nearly everyone of drinking age wants to head out and get a bit hedonistic, but the fleecings being dished out by festival promoters, function hosts and virtually every establishment with a liquor license and a view is just getting out of hand.

The reason I’m going on this rant is related to an invitation the good gentlemen of The Beast recently forwarded to me for a New Year’s Day party being held at Bondi Icebergs – not the perfectly adequate licensed club section, but the rather la-di-da Dining Room & Bar next door.

On New Year’s Day, two aging members of Bondi’s social elite, Maurice Terzini (Icebergs Dining Room & Bar owner) and Angus McDonald (the brains behind Sneaky Sound System – rather than the beauty or the bloke with long hair), will be throwing a bash at the Bergs of the likes you have never seen (unless you were there last year) and, as far as I can tell, everyone is invited, as long you’re happy to go through a mysterious (and slightly wanky/faux exclusive) email submission process and you’ve got four hundred big ones burning a hole in your sky-rocket.

I assume the boys expected me to be flattered, and I probably have would been had they offered to pay for my ticket. Don’t get me wrong, the four hundred bucks does buy you a reasonable amount of bounty, with guests set to be satiated by an endless stream of Veuve Champagne and Ciroc Vodka, as well as the hand crafted fruits (in canapé form) of head chef Monty Kulodrovic’s hard labour.

But I think it’s also fair to suggest that a large percentage of guests will also be shelling out an additional three hundred bucks or so each to ensure that the white Christmas doesn’t end on the 25th, if you know what I mean (wink, wink, nudge, nudge, snort, snort). That’s a minimum seven hundred dollar day, excluding taxis and late night pizza binges.

I should note that there’ll be no shortage of entertainment on show, especially if you’re enamoured by the likes of Bag Raiders, Poolside, Sneaky Sound System and Nicky Night Time, and you like throwing your hands in the air like you just don’t care with a bunch of sweaty, like-minded, booze and drug-addled socialites. I’d personally prefer to pop on a bit of Sinatra, spark up a Cohiba and enjoy some alone time by my private plunge pool, but I don’t think I’m really the target market they’re reaching for anyway.

The more I think about it, though, four hundred probably isn’t actually too much to pay (does that make me a hypocrite?). I’ve heard that bottled water at festivals can cost as much as ten dollars and beer and spirits are creeping up towards the fifteen dollar mark, so it’s not unreasonable to suggest that some young folk will be spending upward of four hundreds bucks on their outing to Field Day.

When I put it that way, the bash at the Bergs might actually be a bargain. So how do I get a ticket again?