Bachelor Parties aren't what they
used to be
For men, bachelor parties have
always been about escape - from the
women in their lives, sobriety, political correctness,
even
consciousness.
Typically a night of debauchery, the bachelor party
offered one
last visit to the underworld before entrance into the
married
world. Nowadays many bridegrooms-to-be are
turning their bachelor
parties into a different kind of journey altogether,
one that offers
a real rather than a whiskey-induced escape.
Whereas guys used to gather at the local steakhouse to
eat red
meat, smoke cigars, drink heavily and await the
"surprise guest,"
many now go fly fishing in New Zealand, sailing in the
Caribbean or
mountain climbing in Colorado.
They still test themselves physically, only in
different, more
printable ways.
"Reasonable, sophisticated guys have gotten to the
point where a
bachelor party that's just getting drunk and making an
attempt to
see a stripper feels wrong," said Joseph Hooper, a
writer in New
York who has been on several bachelor-trip adventures.
"What feels
right is this notion of getting together and going on
a voyage and
having a few all-night talking sessions. Whether it's
going on a
death-defying mountain trip or golfing, the intense
company of male
friends tends to go out of your life once you're
married. The
bachelor party gives you one last shot at that."
In the financial community, the out-of-town bachelor
party has
become almost de rigueur, according to several bankers
and
traders.
"It's a bull-market phenomenon," said a banker who
recently
attended one in Scotland, but requested anonymity.
"Everyone has cash. It's also a time issue," the
banker said.
"My wife is extremely lenient about me going on trips
with friends,
but a lot of women are like: `You're going away this
weekend? Oh, no
you're not.' But if a guy says, `It's a bachelor
party!' that is a
get-out-of-jail-free pass. There's no arguing it."
Traveling, whether it's a cross-country drive or a
long, hard
sail, has always been a way for people to contemplate
big decisions,
test themselves and figure out where they're going
(emotionally and
literally) - all things that make up the new '90s
bachelor party.
Away from it all
For his party last summer, Stephen Home traveled with
three of
his closest friends to Iceland.
"It wasn't a typical 30-people bachelor party in New
York," said
Home, a bond trader in New York City. "The landscape
in Iceland looks like the moon because it's volcanic.
It's almost eerie-looking and very flat.
"You're away from everything and you can really enjoy
being with your friends without any interference
whatsoever," he said. "The old-style bachelor party is
very similar to the wedding. There are so many around
that you're being pulled in different directions and
you're supposed to get really drunk. In the end, you
don't really spend any significant time with the
people."
He added: "On the other hand, when you say you're
going to Iceland for four days, there's a pretty heavy
fallout. There aren't many people who can attend
something like that."
Steve Westerberg, a publishing executive with Conde
Nast in New York, turned his bachelor party two years
ago into a three-day sailing trip.
A group of 12 friends traveled on two boats from
Stonington, Conn., to Rhode Island and back.
"We renamed one of the boats after his wife-to-be,"
said one of the guests, David Jiraneck, an avid sailor
who runs his own theatrical marketing company in
Stamford, Conn. "We wrote all of his ex-girlfriends'
names on the transom with X's through them."
The group spent the first night on an island, eating
lobster in a restaurant where the bridegroom's friends
presented him with a "surprise guest" - a fully
clothed folk singer.
"She actually serenaded Steve with wonderful, original
folk songs - soft rock," Jiraneck said.
For Jiraneck, being on a boat in the middle of the
ocean was ideal for what he called the MB word - male
bonding.
"The nice thing about sailing is you definitely have a
period of time from point A to B," he said. "It feels
like more of a rite of passage."
A wild ride
When David Flemister, a vice president at Young &
Rubicam in New
York, was planning a bachelor party for his brother,
Jonathan, a
building manager, he wanted a trip that would provide
the "thrill"
every bachelor party requires, but in a new way.
They went with 12 friends to Indigo Stables in
Jeffersonville,
N.Y., for a day of horseback riding through the
mountains.
Later, everyone ate dinner around a campfire, and the
guests
spent the night outside in one-person pop-up tents.
But the horses provided the excitement; many of the
guests had
never ridden before.
"Riding gives you a sense of adventure - getting on a
horse is
like getting on a roller coaster," Flemister said.
Stewart Kim, an investment banker, had a bachelor
party that was
such a close bonding experience for those invited that
it verged on
a survival test.
Before marrying Mimi Kim, a fellow banker, he and
several
friends rented a condominium at Myrtle Beach, S.C.,
with plans to
play golf every day. But a hurricane hit, and the men
were stranded
inside for three days, with no electricity.
"It was 16 guys sitting in total darkness," Kim
recalled. "One
guy said, `Mimi has powers we can't even imagine.' "
Brides following suit
Perhaps inspired by the trips their fiances are
taking, more
than a few brides-to-be are turning their bachelorette
parties into
three- or four-day marathons of bonding activities.
Nancy Stout, a sales manager for Quadrille, a fabric
house in
New York City, recently organized a party for her
friend Muffy
Fuller, a sales training consultant for Fuller
Communications of
Boston.
Ten women from all over the country spent three days
together at
a beach house in Bay Head, N.J.
"Back in the '80s, we would take the bride out and
have her
drink and do crazy things," said Stout, who is in her
early 30s.
"But now it's about bonding and rekindling old
relationships and
learning about people's lives."
Stout chose Bay Head because, as she put it: "It's
very beachy
and laid back. Every day we walked to the beach and
set up a picnic,
with 10 of us together in our tight little circle. We
talked about
relationships and getting older and the fact that
marriage is a
scary experience but definitely worth it. The whole
weekend was more
of a learning experience than anything else."
Even 10 years ago, it was very unusual for anyone to
call a
bachelorette or bachelor party a learning experience,
except in the
most sarcastic way.
But now many young brides and bridegrooms view their
prewedding
parties much the way they view marriage - they want it
to challenge
them, to be heartfelt and positive.
Many speak about both marriage and their prewedding
parties with striking sincerity.
Not a last gasp
Christopher Robbins, the owner and founder of the
Hickory Group,
a marketing company in New York, held his bachelor
party a few weeks
ago at his family's country house in Bondville, Vt.
His father and best man, Ken Robbins, organized the
party,
bringing about a dozen friends together for three days
of
practically nonstop canoeing, biking, golf, billiards,
darts,
Frisbee and volleyball.
"My dad titled it a last gasp, but a bachelor party
for me is an
amazing beginning," Robbins said. "The experience of
the whole
weekend solidified my friendships for the future. It
wasn't like
`This guy is going to be lost to the winds of
marriage.' It was not
a goodbye. It was a rekindled hello."