The Gathering
    Partyreport


We started from the Lofoten Islands on
Saturday  11th  in  the  evening.  The
boat  we  travelled  with to Trondheim
was one of the oldest Coastliners, and
the  cabins  were  as  small  as  Erik
Solheim's   brain   (applies  only  to
Norwegians).  There were 2 showers for
us  to  use  - unfortunately they were
both  dirty and clogged.  After almost
two  days  of  us  having to withstand
Brainbug's  puke and noTch11's immense
boozing,   we   finally   arrived   at
Trondheim  harbour.   With  our greasy
hair  and  the  intense  smell  in the
stuffed  car, we moved on.  There were
only some 500 kilometres left.

Our  first  pit  stop  was  at a Shell
station,  then  we moved on to a Motel
close  to  the  partyplace.  The Motel
rooms   were   kind   of  crazy-built;
probably  adapted  to Japanese people.
We  arrived  there  mid-day on Monday,
and had almost two days to kill before
the  party.   We didn't meet any other
freaks  the days before the party, but
we  met  a lot of cute girls in Oslo -
and  two  confuzed  danes  asked where
they  could  buy champagne and wine...
Hehehe...   in  Norway all booze-shops
close  early due to the SSM (Socialist
State Monopoly)!


On  the first day of the party, we got
up  some  time between 06:00 and 15:00
and  travelled a few kilometres on the
icy  roads.  (Who said Southern Norway
is   any  warmer  than  the  beautiful
North?  ...  Ok, the roads weren't icy
at  all.) There was a tremendous queue
at  the  partyplace, and after waiting
for  approx.   10  cans  of  coke,  we
finally  could  enter our handles etc.
into  the  sophisticated  database  (3
computers  had  been  set  up for this
particular event).

The  hall  itself  was  - shall we say
huge  -  and there was a Coke stand at
the  entrance.   In  the main entrance
there  was  a cafeteria.  Crs/Dln said
in  the invitations that you could get
everything  here,  including  a decent
breakfast.  Well, we could have pizza,
small  breads  with  ham  and  cheese,
pizza,  beverages (coke) and of course
also pizza.

The  toilets...  were o.k.  - although
they  were  out of paper at the end of
the party...  I wouldn't say they gave
a new meaning to the word "disgusting"
(like  the  Amega  party  in Porsgrunn
last summer), but a cleaner could have
been  hired.   When  it  comes  to the
showers, I would have appreciated some
hot  water...   It  was  o.k.   in the
beginning  -  but  after 2-3 days, one
could  ice-bath in the showers.  There
were  however a lot of showers, and no
one had to walk around smelling like a
horse   for   five  days.   (Like  the
invitation  said!)  ...   That  is for
those who enjoy the cold water...

The  first  day  of  the  party,  many
so-called  "local  lamers" showed up -
but  as  time  passed,  more  and more
people  from  the  scene  arrived.  We
chatted,  and  did  all the things one
normally   does   at   a  party.   The
diskthrowing  competition  was  crazy!
People  threw  disks and pizza cartons
etc.  around the whole place

On the 4th day of the party, everybody
(well,  almost everybody) were waiting
for    the    main    event...     The
competitions!   We  were  supposed  to
begin   voting   at   1400   hours  on
Saturday,  but  the deadline was moved
and  moved...   And playing the music,
showing  the  pictures  and  the demos
took  quite a while, so we didn't vote
until early Sunday.

The  voting  system was kind of weird;
you  could  only  vote for one in each
category.   I can understand this when
it  comes  to  the  music competition,
because there were only a few tunes of
the "top ten" that deserved a vote.  I
don't   know  how  the  jury  was  put
together,  maybe  the drunken girls at
the party had picked half of the tunes
in   the   "top   ten".    Tunes  from
Heatbeat/Carillion,    Anders   Hamre,
Brainbug/Alcatraz,  Mr.  Man, Headx or
Lord  Interface - all three members of
Andromeda  - were not played.  Instead
the    "jury"    had    picked    some
techno-crap,  and  a  few nice tunes -
from     i.e.     Jester/Sanity    and
Lizardking/Strange.   The  funny thing
is  that the techno tune "Gin" won the
whole    competition!    I'm   looking
forward  to  get  an explaination from
Crusaders  and Deadline about the jury
system - they did not want to give one
at the party!

As  for the gfx competition, we didn't
get to see the different pictures on a
decent  screen  (like  the  invitation
said)  -  so  we  had  to vote without
having   seen  the  pictures  clearly.
However,  the  winning picture "Beauty
and  the  Beast" from Equinox was very
nice.

Demos!   There were a lot of them, and
the  DOS demo from Andromeda had quite
a   lot   of  new  ideas  in  it,  but
Spaceballs  had  created  a quite cool
demo   which  won.   Andromeda's  demo
ended  on  2nd place.  There were many
cool  demos,  but  these  two were the
better ones.

After  the  voting,  people started to
pack   their  stuff.   It  took  hours
before  the  organizers  announced the
winners.    We  had  left  before  the
winners  were announced...  But all in
all  this  was  a  great  party  - and
Crs/Dln  did  a  quite nice job.  Some
things   could've   been   handled  in
another  way,  but  then:   Nobody  is
perfect!

Our  voyage  home was terribly boring;
after  only  about  10  hours of sleep
during  the  five  days,  we were dead
tired...


     Notch11 and Micro-Pal of Alcatraz