(google images)- Ah the front door, After sculling some off licence wine we had to pretend to be sober enough to pass the ridiculous amount of security at this front door, a good indicator of how drunk you were was if you tried desperately to go in via the exit door... why they insisted on having two doors next to one another with three security guards for each ill never know.
Ahhh, the 101 Bar- The first place I ever went out to in London. I loved and loathed it in equal parts but in all honesty I had some amazing nights out in this seedy club and I made some of my best friends while drunken dancing there. The 101 Bar was on a dingy corner under and train bridge on Tottenham Court Road- Its a bit to close to Oxford st to be classed as Soho but a bit too close to Soho to be classed as anything else. (Soho being a great place for evenings out)
The reason the 101 became a haunt for the marylebone crew was because of its late entry hours, we would all finish work between 10.30 and 1pm and not ready to head home we wanted somewhere to drink and party and laugh about the night we'd had. The 101 became our local. It was always packed with hip hop dancers that couldn't quite get it right, gangsters who probably rented those gold chains around their necks and chicks who were tougher than the poor lads they were dragging about the dance floor. The music was an odd mix of last months Pop songs, R'n'B, Gansta beats and some cool Latino jives. It was easy music to dance to, easier to laugh at how corny the music was and if you were like me and just looking for a way to shake off the trials of the day the 101 was an easy place to let your hair down.
(google images) Check out the decor! I do not remember it being this flash at all, to be honest i remember a dark dance floor, cranky bartenders, endless stairs to the top floor and a ladies toilet that I'm sure doubled as a brothel. Perhaps my memories are biased because we never used to arrive in the sober hours of the evening, by midnight these poor chairs were probably covered in lord knows what and all kinds of interesting characters. No wonder i never dallied long enough for a second glance haha
I have such great memories of drinking too much here, dancing with Avinash, Lily and Fraz, almost getting into fights with the scary bitchatchoes on the D Floor and screaming matches with co workers out the front. I've since walked past the old hang spot and found that its long closed down, it was always inevitable but i felt a tug at the ol heartstrings as i remembered all the fun I'd had there.
I used to love it when it came to 9pm- the time of night to begin thinking about closing up at work and someone would bring up going for drinks after- Lily and Sam would always yell 'Not 101, that place is shit!' and the answer would always be 'c'mon guys its not so bad? ok so its terrible but what else is open so late!?'. Like clockwork haha.
Eventually we did discover another late entry club 'Roadhouse' (more on this later) and the 101 was no more. But for the first few months of my life in London a good night out was one where you didn't get ripped off, hit on, yelled at or stolen from at the 101.... It marked a time in my life when I felt young and inexperienced in the workings of London, a time when Avinash and I would share out private jokes and laugh hysterically at each other all night. A time when Fraz tried to teach my drunken self to dance like a latino. A time when all of us at work were partners in crime, friends and comrades. Before all the fights and misunderstandings. A time for crazy stories and drunken antics.
The beautiful Lily and I at the 101 bar. Despite how much she complained about the place she was always the first in the door and on the dance floor. Ah I certainly miss you and your craziness madame
One of the more memorable nights was the night that I got into a yelling match out the front of 101. The evening was great fun, the group took out a newbie from work and we had the best time dancing and laughing and doing shots from the bar, that is until a certain Russian colleague decided to get all antsy in his pantsy at the bar tender and try and drag avinash into a three way fight outside. I with my big mouth gave them both a dressing down for their behaviour and wound up being yelled at for this and that. So i just laughed, then trotted off and made my way towards the night bus. It wasn't too long before Avinash caught up with me to apologise and yell something about friends and stop me from going home. He wouldn't hear of me ending the night on a bad note so he hailed a cab and promised to take me to an all hours Chinese restaurant in china town... What a great friend he is :) It wasn't all roses however, it took us near 2 hours to find the bloody restaurant he had been to at 4am yesterday morning, the two of us were little use stumbling about china town trying to find this place that i wasn't sure even existed! But exist it did and we arrived quick enough to order 50 pound worth of Chinese... for those that aren't aware of meal prices in London this is a lot of money. We were quickly served with 8 or so dishes and told that the restaurant closed in 20 minutes so down the hatch it all went. burning our tongues and the roof of our mouths on the way. we didn't care. we had our crab beer, we were drunk and laughing at the amount of food and at the antics of the other drunks in the store. And then it was time to head home. So drunk and full with no tubes running i caught myself a cab and arrived in my bed looking like I'd swallowed a hippo. After three hours of sleep it was time to shower and head back to work to regale tales of the night with the rest of the gang...
Meet avinash, i love him dearly! He and I were the original partners in crime that rounded up the gang for nights out, This is him at Chinese on one of the last night he lived in London. I miss you buddy and am super excited to visit you in Mumbai. Thanks for being the glue that held us all together xxx
The morning after a night out was always worth the wait, while running around during service we would all be sharing tidbits and having 'oh my god i don't remember doing that!' moments. It was always a laugh to see what you had forgotten and what other people remembered from the night. Work went quicker with the 101 gang about. We really were a team. And so I guess it wasn't really even the 101 bar that made those days great, I guess when you go anywhere with people you care for great times can be had...so thanks for all the memories guys! You know who you crazy cats are.
