One, two, three and freeze

WHERE WILL Chennai rock now?

Or jive or let her hair down or simply, dance. After the night falls and darkness settles comfortably over the city, you can no longer head towards Nungambakkam cherishing fond hopes of a `wild night' out. Nay, sir, no more.

Even as the axe fell on Chennai's most happening disc, people wondered what they'd do for the kind of entertainment they were getting used to and yes, most of us enjoying it too. Party animals will now just have to do without HFO, since Hell Froze Over. Yesterday.

At least, officially, the word is that the discotheque is being closed `temporarily' for `renovation', but by now the HFO crowd has already smelt out a not so happy future. The fact that the alternative is a long drive down to EC-41 on East Coast Road, does not help any. ``Driving down once in a while is perhaps fun, but certainly, we cannot make it as frequently as we used to chill out at HFO,'' says Ravi Kumar, who has been there and `seen it all'.

The staple of HFO is really the teeny-bopper crowd, which will have a problem getting anxious parents to say `aye' to weekly trips to the beach at night. `` If we had an alternative in the city, then we'd have a place to go to. But trying to convince our parents to let us go out all that way at night, that's next to impossible'', sighs Annie Amuthan.

And the HFO regulars have come to the conclusion that it is politics that forced the shut down of their regular haunt. ``It is miserable that entertainment should be mixed with politics,'' says Geoffrey Sanjay, who claims he's been there `almost every Saturday since it started'. He is going to miss listening to the techno, remixes, Tamil and Hindi pop that shake the very beams of HFO every night. And the DJ's. Basically, the feel of being there and doing a merry jig. And the women are feeling miserable too, since Wednesday nights were happy hours for them. For the women who do not fancy a drink, it was a night of wholesome entertainment, `completely free'. ``Around 12 of us girls used to troop in and dance on the floor till it was time to leave. And not pay a penny for it,'' says Pallavi Krishnan.

That leaves just Park Sheraton's Gatsby, but everybody knows that it is in a different range altogether, pricey and for `members'. All this when Chennai was just beginning to get `hip, hop and hep'. The partying junta is now wondering about what is to happen with the onslaught of a seemingly saffron-like brigade, whether worse will come. HFO is out, yes, at least for the moment, but will `Snow Bowling' go `Down Under' too?

By Ramya Kannan

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