St Anselm Hall and Canterbury Court Ball
Every year, for one magical evening, the students of Kent Road East forget their studying woes and instead enjoy a night of fine dining, music, and socialising. There is no other event in the Hall calendar quite like the St Anselm Hall and Canterbury Court Easter Ball.
After months of hard work, the Royal Variety Ball took place on the 30th of March with 120 guests from both St Anselm Hall and Canterbury Court, dressed resplendently.
Work began on constructing the look for the Ball earlier in the day and a group of dedicated hall members from the Ball Committee toiled; putting up a canopy of lights, moving and setting out the tables, printing personalised name cards, serving wine, distributing the favours. Right up to the line, when guests were beginning to arrive, the final touches were being put together to make everything just right. Key to this setting up was primarily Secretary Kyle Fogarty, with several others including Thomas Rennie, Alice Codling, Esperanza Hughes-Salinas, and Egor Egorov.
Was all of this work worth it? Judging by the response from students throughout the night: absolutely. A magnificent meal was prepared by Dave and the rest of the kitchen staff, the hall was more like the dining room of Buckingham Palace than St Anselm Hall; the students had abandoned their jogging bottoms and unwashed t-shirts in favour of their finest suits and dresses.
Not only was the setting right but the entertainment more than met the mark as well. At the reception, Martini Prosecco was handed out by resplendent Egorov and Rennie, and later a cocktail bar was set up in the open JCR to delight us with concoctions. Throughout the evening there were shouts and cries of amazement as Rod Hande, a professional magician, displayed feats that go beyond the realms of reason and could make even the biggest of cynics into a believer.
After the meal, and a quick turnaround of furniture, the next stage of the evening began. A led Ceilidh, by Chimera Ceilidh, got everyone involved with energetic dancing to the live band. Even as a spectator sport the show was enthralling. It was great to see Ian Armstrong, Food Rep and Social Secretary Elect, galloping his partner down the room, or the tall Marc Krempl ducking beneath other dancer’s arms (which is quite a feat!).
Although some might have gotten their heart rates up with the Ceilidh, the end was not yet nigh. Next up were the Bee Flats, a saxophone quartet of fellow students, to play popular songs in their own style that kept the party going until 11pm.
And, as all things at Slems tend to do, eventually everyone piled into the bar until its close at 3am the next morning, played to the very end by DJ Yesh.
The St Anselm Hall and Canterbury Court Easter Ball is always a fantastic event, but this year has been something special – largely in part to the massive amount of work done by the St Anselm Hall JCR, Canterbury Court RA, and the Easter Ball Committee. Although guests might have cursed the
evening for the hangovers they suffered the next morning, they will enjoy the memories of the night for long after their
By Robert Boddy, JCR President 2018-2019