Preparations for a Eurovision Song Contest Party!

Today is the Eurovision Song Contest Day - and sadly, I'm excited!

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For years and years I've watched Eurovision. I know its dreadful, I know majority of the music sucks and I also know United Kingdom will never win again. But I still love it.

Over the last few years, my friends and I have joked about having a Eurovision Song Contest Party. As no one ever organises it and the day sneaks up on us, we tend to all gather in an online chatroom and chat/watch together, across the internet. However this time last year, I marked it as a Facebook events for around May 2014 sometime and I was determined to make it happen. Now, it is.

During the last few months, we've been vaguely planning this party. I didn't want to go to an awful lot of fuss, as I do that every time we have a murder mystery. Instead I wanted something more casual and relaxed that didn't require an awful lot of fuss. So this is what we did...

In mid-March (Chris' birthday party night in fact), Nat and I sat down and figured out a list of the 12 most likely countries to qualify for Eurovision this year. We looked up the Wiki page, found out who had qualified every year for the last five years and narrowed it down. We were left with: Azerbaijan, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Moldova, Romania, Russia, Spain, Ukraine and United Kingdom. There was 10 of us attending, so we placed countries in one bowl, names in another and picked out a country for each person.

The Ukraine and United Kingdom were the only ones left. As there was still to be Semi-Finals to decide definite entrants, we left it that if someone didn't qualify at the last minute, they could switch to United Kingdom as an easy last minute option.

The idea of the evening, is really just to have a little fun. Of course, ultimately we all support the UK, but that's not very much fun. Instead we have to support the country we drew, by dressing to represent our country and also providing food and drink for it. Dress code can be anything from stereotypical representation of the country, their flag colours, or any other way to define yourself as that country. On top of that for food and drink, everyone brings with them one item of food to share and one drink - again representing their country.

One day, when discussing it with my mum, she pointed out that there are always countries that are guaranteed a place every year. This was the first I'd heard of it. I looked on the Eurovision website and although for the most part I had picked the main qualifying countries, there was also Italy which we hadn't got covered. I offered it up to the group and Amy very quickly switched from Romania to Italy.

I then wrote up a list of each person's country, song entry and matching YouTube video. This was the list:

Azerbaijan - Jon (Semi 1) Dilara Kazimova - Start A Fire (Video)
Denmark - Chris L (Guaranteed Final) - Basim - Cliché Love Song (Video)

France - Chris D (Guaranteed Final) - Twin Twin - Moustache (Video)
Germany - Bel (Guaranteed Final) - Elaiza - Is It Right (Video)
Greece - Erika (Semi 2) - Freaky Fortune feat. Risky Kidd - Rise up (Video)
Ireland - Tom (Semi 2) - Can-Linn (feat. Kasey Smith) (Video)
Moldova - Nat (Semi 1) - Cristina Scarlat - Wild Soul (Video)
Italy - Amy (Guaranteed Final) - Emma Marrone - La Mia Città (Video)
Russia - Adam (Semi 1) - Tolmachevy Sisters - Shine (Video)
Spain - Chris B (Guaranteed Final) - Ruth Lorenzo - Dancing In The Rain (Video)

Chris drew Denmark (the host country) and I drew Germany. We were both fairly pleased with that. We started to put some thought into what we might do, knowing we wanted to keep it simple. Chris decided he would make bacon bread - its not Danish, but he's almost famous for it in our friend circle and if he added Danish bacon, then it represents Denmark right? I decided on Bratwurst sausages, probably as hot dogs.

We went shopping on Thursday to get everything we needed. Chris got his bacon and strong white flour, while I got my Bratwurst and hot dog rolls. We scoured the shelves for alcohol too and we were ages in the aisle! In the end, Chris got Carlsberg, Danish beer - and I got Liebfraumilch, German wine. When we got home, I noticed the Semi Finals of Eurovision were on tv, or at least the second part. As we sat down to half watch them, I looked up to see who had made it through from the first semi finals.

Unfortunately, Nat's country were out - Moldova! I had to let her know she needed a new country! Within about 30 minutes, the results of the other semi final were through and this time Ireland was out! That's Nat's partner Tom's country. So now both of them had to pick new countries, with only 2 days to go before the evening!

Tom picked United Kingdom, which didn't really surprise me - and Nat picked Sweden (I'm not sure why!). I personally would have picked Austria as their entry was... interesting!

Now, tonight is the night. I still have a few bits and pieces I want to do to decorate and whatnot, but otherwise I'm looking for an easy and simple set up. Sadly Chris is working and won't be back till about 10pm, but at least he'll be able to join us for the results!

So who will you be routing for tonight, if anyone? Would you throw a Eurovision Party?