REVIEW: Pembroke Ball

You didn’t miss anything.

pembroke ball utter waste of time

High-profile music acts. Professional organisation and friendly staff. Impressive lay-out and imaginative scenery. Exhilarating atmosphere.

Pour up, drank. Head shot, drank. Pass out, drank.

Pembroke Ball had literally none of these things.

A heavy-goods vehicle containing £100,000 worth of gardening equipment was stolen from a council depot in Edinburgh this weekend, but undoubtedly the biggest robbery of the week was the £85 (plus £3.20 booking fee, bros!) that people are now regretting having spent on going to this.

This will not be pleasant to hear for the Committee (who I’m sure will not be reading this), given they probably put a lot of time and effort into the night.

But ordering 1000 bottles of Absolut and getting a Mission Burrito stand next to a silent disco doesn’t turn your College into Notting Hill Carnival.

One reveller told me that “It was a big night. Absolutely nuts.”

Woodstock was ‘nuts’. The Rumble in the Jungle was ‘nuts’. This was not ‘nuts’.

Complementing the shambolic organisation and unoriginal theme (Around The World In 80 Days), the ‘entertainment’ was provided by Jacob Banks, Ed Gamble and Jack LNDN.

The torrential rain didn’t help – but an exciting event would have made you forget the weather or see it as a lovable quirk rather than a metaphor for the evening.

All aboard, bros.

Even the numerous people who snuck into the Ball couldn’t kid themselves they had fun, especially in the light of LMH and Keble’s impressive shows last weekend.

If I was a security guard, after 8 hours of standing in the rain and watching the bullet-fingers of the black tie brigade, I would probably hate everyone.

But the level of scumbaggery encountered on the door was remarkable, locking the gates after 10pm and unnecessarily heavy-handing anyone who dared to ask where facilities were.

It was quite clear the authorities were having their trousers pulled down by the sheer number of people on the premises who hadn’t paid, but the appropriate response to this is not to refuse re-entry to a paying female student who simply left the ball for ten minutes to collect her EpiPen from outside.

Most people predictably attempted to squeeze out every single pound they had wasted on an expensive ticket at a low-budget, high-priced, poorly-organised non-ball.

But very few balls are worth your money, and it’s important to accept this, so you’re not found at the silent disco at 3.45am with the five friends you go to bops with, refusing to accept Your Best Night Ever is ending.