Glamborous
>> DIY PARTY VIBES
Living in Honolulu, there are exciting things happening in nightlife just about every day of the week.
While going out to shows, concerts, movies and night clubs is a great way to meet new people or catch up with friends, throwing your own get-together is a fun way to bond, too, especially if you can get everyone to pitch in.
In preschool, we were read a book called Stone Soup, which tells a story about a traveler using the novelty and curiosity of soup made out of stone to encourage a group of villagers to each add something to the pot to help the soup reach its full potential. At the end of story, a rather miserly bunch of villagers learns that by chipping in, a nourishing meal can be fed to all.
While I’m not necessarily recommending a group soup party, it actually does seem like it could be fun. In Japan, there is a comical eating game where participants each bring unusual items that don’t usually belong in a soup — like pizza, chicken nuggets, potato chips or pineapple — to concoct a soup. Every participant must eat whatever portion of the soup that they are served, and the game is performed in the dark, so you can’t see what you are going to get. If drinking better suits your fancy, this could easily be adapted into a community punch shot game where everyone adds a shot of different liquor.
At a potluck or barbecue, once somebody provides the basics of a cooler to keep drinks cold and a grill to heat things up, there usually ends up being more food to go around than can be consumed. Kakaako Waterfront Park is a perfect place for gatherings — and all it takes is a boom box and some tunes to have a turn up summer jam.
While it always would be better to have an actual DJ, if a generator and PA system are out of the question for your DIY gathering, there are a few apps out there that can help keep the party flowing with no breaks in the music. Traktor, one of the top professional laptop DJ software makers, has a decent iOS app if you want to manually mix songs on your phone. Pacemaker actually does a great job of mixing tracks automatically for you if you take the time to make party playlists with similar BPMs. You also can just do a little bit of planning ahead and check SoundCloud or Mixcloud for a few hot DJ mixes to play and keep the party popping.
If every person brings a bottle of something, you can have a full bar in no time — and the opportunity to experience different drinks that you might not have the courage or funds to experiment with when you’re out at a club.
Perhaps more importantly, when you come together with friends to plan something fun together, you feel a sense of pride and bonding, like the time and event that you shared was really your own and that things couldn’t have gone down the way they did without the contribution of everybody involved.
