Tonight Pauline was intent on having a proper girl’s night out which involved dressing up, dinner and dancing. She seems to have a fairly decent talent for getting us all out for a girl’s night out! In all my time here London I don’t think we’ve really ever done going out properly with a group of us from work – more often than not we just roll drinks after work into drinks and dancing at a club. Pauline wanted our night to be fairly special so Natalie suggested she could get us on to the list for Paper. I’m obviously not Cool People because I’d never heard of it! But apparently Paper has earned a reputation of being quite the high-profile celebrity club.

Before heading to Paper, which didn’t open until 10pm, we grabbed a bite to eat at Imperial China. It felt a bit weird eating Chinese dressed as we were that’s for sure! The meal was pretty nice though seemed quite expensive for one plate of food (over £20). Sadly this is also where Vishali and Sandra departed us for the night for their respective reasons (too much partying and bad knee?) So, it was left up to Pauline, Jenny, Shona, Natalie and I to strut our stuff.

Paper is in the lower ground/basement of Café Royal which seemed kind of strange. Apparently entry is by VIP list only and at a cost of £15. When we got downstairs the bar area was fairly empty. Granted it was 10.30pm but still. There seemed to be a restaurant are but most people were streaming out of the joint rather than hanging around. I think by about 11pm or 11.30pm the girls started coming in. Just girls. Then a few guys but not that many. I’d say in the end it was 70% girls and 30% boys. Here is us waiting for the dance floor to open up:

By about midnight, I reckon, the doors to another room opened up. I think this was the main dance area. It was kind of manic as everyone tried to squeeze into the place. People were not very polite is all I can say. We followed everyone else in and managed to find a bit of space to get groovy. The only thing was that it was very difficult because the room was heaving and we were constantly being pushed back and forth. The funniest moments were when guys (and occasionally girls) would just come up and dance against your back without really dancing with you if you can picture. In addition to the room we were in I think there were also supposed to be a few other rooms – probably for the VVVIP unlike us! We were a bit too shy to have a proper search around so stuck to the main room for dancing:

In addition to the room we were in I think there were also supposed to be a few other rooms – probably for the VVVIP unlike us! We were a bit too shy to have a proper search around so stuck to the main room for dancing. We were in there for a couple of hours – the music was now and then acceptable but for the most part pretty rubbish. Don’t know if it was just the DJ that night but it certainly wasn’t my style.

Overall I was expecting great things of Paper but in the end it was a disappointment. The place seemed to be filled with posers and try hards. For example, there were a couple of groups around the place who were there for their Christmas do and whenever they bought bottles of vodka the bartenders would come charging through with the bottles held high in the air with giant sparklers and then proceed to hand them to the revelers who in turn would wave the sparklers in the air. It just wasn’t cool. At least the bar staff were quite nice and one in particular very cute!