The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Coimbatore News : The whole family is involved

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 31, 2010
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Coimbatore

The whole family is involved

Amutha Kannan

Community celebrations are gaining popularity in the city

Residents of gated communities, apartments and colonies are holding get-togethers
Neighbours can mingle well and teenagers need not be chaperoned

File Photo: K. Ananthan

Joyful occasion: Families celebrating New Year in the city. –

COIMBATORE: The term “bringing in the New Year” to many means midnight partying.

And that is also synonymous with dancing and consuming alcohol.

Since all these are made available in ball rooms or bars of hotels or resorts, those who cannot afford to spend the few thousands they charge for a couple, move over quietly into the New Year, watching related events on television at home.

Category

There is also another category that can spend but prefers a sober sailing into the New Year.

Community celebrations on New Year's Eve are gaining popularity.

Earlier, community celebrations used to be restricted to the midnight parties at the Officers' Mess of the tri-services or club houses of a few corporate houses.

But now this has given way to residents of gated communities, apartments and colonies, organising get-togethers within their premises.

The concept has caught on in a big way and increasingly even apartment complexes of 10 to 15 houses have started organising these.

According to the residents, the advantages are manifold. The socialising and party-loving types still get to enjoy, but in a safe and mostly alcohol-free atmosphere.

There are no strangers, neighbours can mingle well and teenaged children need not be chaperoned.

The cost for the entertainment and food is shared and this works out to affordable sums.

Even the quiet ones, who stay off parties, become part of the fun.

Asha Vikram, mother of a college-going daughter and son, who stays in a gated community, says she has no fear of her husband driving back home after a party on a road filled with drunken revellers and she need not worry about the company her children keep at midnight parties.

Besides, the whole family is together during the celebrations.

Varun Das, a third-year student of a city college, says though he was initially sceptical about the ‘bland' celebration in his complex, he has grown to like it. The family and friends are together.

“We are also allowed to include guests. In hotels we are not allowed in as stags.

“There is compulsion to find a partner. Here we are free to enjoy. There is entertainment, dance and good food.”

Guests

Families who do not live in complexes or gated communities like to get invited as guests in these community celebrations rather than spend their time among strangers at hotels or resorts.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Tamil Nadu

News Update

Stories in this Section