Hot spot ... celebrating New Year in a Beirut night club. Photograph: Patric Baz/AFP/Getty
In an article in today's Guardian, a gaggle of foreign correspondents were set the enviable task of staking out a Saturday night in the best nightclubs and watering holes of their host cities before reporting back to HQ with their recommendations.
Tom Phillips makes Cabaret Kalsea a safe bet for a night out in Rio De Janeiro thanks to its "Carnival masks, his and hers strippers, the best samba in town - and a free mug of pumpkin soup at the end of the night". For those who might find themselves in Nairobi of a weekend, Xan Rice recommends a spot of bar hopping in the city's Kenyatta Avenue. Luke Harding has difficulty getting into Moscow's hottest club; at least he knows to be "cute-dressing and not drunk" next time he wants to mix with the rich and beautiful at Fabrique.
But it's all very well knowing where to step out in Nairobi and Mexico City, but it's more likely that your next Saturday night will be spent closer to home. I for instance will soon be heading not to Mongolia but to Manchester where one of the clubs I haven't yet visited is WHP 07 (but that's mainly because it hasn't actually open yet).
WHP stands for Warehouse Project, a season of club nights held in the space underneath Manchester's Piccadilly station. Run by the people behind Manchester's heir apparent to the Hacienda, Sankeys Soap, last year's WHP captured everything that's irresistible about the city's nightlife: unashamedly happy people dancing their feet off to fantastic music.
So here's the question you knew was coming: where would you send a stranger looking to spend their Saturday night in your town?
