Cynics say it gets earlier every year. If, like me, you work voluntarily for a certain radio station in the Kingston area, they may actually have a point – for us Christmas is celebrated in January! Before you say it, this is not woefully bad mistiming on behalf of the management. It’s just part of the tradition that is the Radio Station Christmas Meal.
Xmas meal - a social minefield?
This year I have been volunteered to help organise it, which no real problem as I’ve done this kind of thing before. Past experience has shown that the hosting of a successful Radio Station meal is a bit of a dark art, as there are many things that can go pair shaped at the first opportunity. One year, everyone found the food at a popular eatery near the Kingston Hill locale to be totally unpalatable. The news that the restaurant went out of business shortly afterwards came as no surprise!
At another meal, many years ago, I witnessed the only radio station fight – we had invited two representatives of a local commercial radio station along in an attempt to forge links with the community – it was something like that anyway. What happened was that one of them got incredibly drunk and was getting out of control – at one point he licked the bald head of an increasingly uncomfortable radio volunteer who had definitely had not signed up for this! Things came to a head (see what I did there!) when the representative’s colleague, after taking a whole evenings worth of his abuse, punched him in the face. It certainly calmed him down a bit though!
Another far less dramatic incident occurred when we all went to a remote restaurant that formed part of a hotel in Esher. Towards the end of the evening, myself and three other radio station members, all of us slightly the worse for drink, had just left the main building with a view to getting back to Kingston. A car pulled up and stopped in front of us. We all piled in grateful for the shelter from the winters chill, and waited politely to be asked where we wanted to be driven. After about five minutes the silence was starting to become uncomfortable. The driver suddenly piped up, and informed us that he wasn’t actually a mini cab, and that he didn’t have room for us and his family. We took the hint and went back to the bar to arrange a proper taxi.
That said, there have been some very good Christmas do’s, such as the one held at the function room of the Fountain pub in New Malden. Another aspect of these events is timing – December is a terrible month for trying to organise a social gathering as people are usually busy with their own yuletide preparations, which is why the mid January date has been favoured in more recent times.
Venue is another of those variables in the mix – trying to find a place which is easily accessible to all members is trickier that you’d think. At the moment I am considering the Rotunda in Kingston. This has quite a few restaurants within the complex, a couple of which do the Italian/English fare that tends to suit most people. Also, it has very good train and bus links.
At the moment I am just testing the water, trying to find out how many members would be prepared to commit to a meal. About a week ago I issued a memo asking for people to sign if they were interested. To date quite a few people have added their signature to it. These early signs are positive, and the fact that we are even thinking of organising a Christmas meal serves as another indicator that the Radio Station is turning the corner, and is coping with the difficulties that have beset us over the last eighteen months or so.
