It goes without saying that when someone has friends visiting the island, all of your island friends come out to meet them. This is partially because hosting guests comes with a little bit of pressure to make sure you show them a good time and it's nice to help your friend do so. But an even bigger reason is that it's a novelty for your island friends to meet new people and see new faces in the familiar haunts. As an added bonus, sometimes the old friends are also great for sharing embarrassing old stories while the new friends fill them in on any embarrassing moments they didn't get to bear witness to...fun for everyone!
So it was recently, I found myself popping into town after work to join a group who were touring Front Street in a happy but wobbly saunter. By the time I arrived, many places were closing down. Friday night in Bermuda is a time honored tradition of Happy Hour which starts at 5:30 at the most westerly event in the courtyard of the Hamilton Princess and carries on as the crowds gradually wander from pub to pub in an easterly fashion until the night's end. This is done with such predictable reliability that pubs actually close in this sequence -- the courtyard at the Princess stops serving around 9 just as people are queuing up at the Lemon Tree. By 12:30 or 1 you can expect the Hog Penny to be done last call, and while Flanagan's will adapt their closing time to their guests, on this particular evening it was all closed up already. This leaves Pickled Onion and Red in the near vicinity, or venturing further east to Cafe Cairo (where i first saw twerking 5 years ago, although that isn't what people were calling it) or Cosmopolitan, and the last stop for any Friday night trooper who can last that long is The Beach. I have to admit for the first 2 years I lived here I felt very left out when I would hear everyone at work saying "and then we went to the beach and kept partying." I really wanted to sit around the beach late at night around the bonfire, and wished they would organize this just once before i had already gone home. Eventually, late one night I carried on past Flanagan's on a Scottish holiday in the company of 2 kilted friends and finally they said "do ye wanna go to the beach?" I said "Sure!" And that's how i found The Beach bar and bistro, and felt a little less disappointed about missing all those nice evenings on the sand by the ocean, since they had never actually happened.
Anyway, 2 doors stand side by side on Front Street, the one of the left is to the Pickled Onion, the one on the right is to Red. Pickled Onion was the plan, but after briefly considering the wobbliest guest and determining the incline of the staircase to either place was about the same, I decided there was no harm in trying Red. Up we went, under the chandelier and into a nice decorum, settled into a nice spot, and mosied up to the bar to get some drinks for the friends. There is nothing that irks me more than standing at a bar, getting jostled left and right, and having the bartender serve 4 people around you who arrived after you arrived in the quasi mosh pit before finally taking your order. It requires an exceptional display of bad service where I don't want to leave a tip, but this was absolutely one of them. I had enough time to stand there and plot that I would write "I am not tipping you because..." but sadly it's Bermuda and 17% is automatically added to all orders, so I just had to fantasize about not tipping to pass the time. Red had me seeing red by charging me a $3.65 tip for the privilege of NOT being served for 10 minutes. It's not a large sum of money, but my analytical brain was just very annoyed that the rate of pay works out to an additional $21.90 and hour for non-service. As a disclaimer, yes I have been a waitress and I was a lot more efficient, probably because tips were earned and not presumed. And no, I didn't have to walk to school every day, uphill both ways. Rant over. So I passed out the drinks and decided to look around and enjoy the scene.
I really did love the interior design...i could see Red translocated to a trendy little spot somewhere in Las Vegas -- a very posh glass display behind the bar, crazy 70's wallpaper and an old chandelier, frosted glass walls with the R logo, a balcony to sit outside and watch the street below. What also caught my attention was the crowd that was in Red. I didn't see any familiar faces, and the vibe was that of a subtler Cafe Cairo. It was a little less dressy than I expected -- the girls were polished but in more casual attire than one usually sees and as for the guys, Red is absolutely bringing back the leisure suit and a few of the dance moves it was associated with. I will probably give it another try some other time, perhaps earlier, but none of us really felt like it was out kind of that night. In hindsight, the door on the left may just have been a better fit for our group than the door on the right.
On the bright side, it inspired me to go out and take a picture on where it is located, so I will leave you with that today.
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| Red |
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| Front Street on Hamilton |
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