Starring: Claire, Dan, Geri, Ian, John, Justin, Mark, Michelle, Pete & Vishal. Finding it a bit dull? Skip to the rubber chicken. Skip to memory of lesbians. Skip to first lesbian activity. Skip to the transvestites Back to Front meal. Skip to quotes. For the 2006 RGBI Back To Front party, a record turnout of 10 members of Deben Rotaract were heading South, to the premier seaside town of Bournemouth. Claire, Mark, Michelle and Dan set off together. John, travelling direct from a day in London, arrived at the Glendevon Hotel first and collected everyones keys, to allow the hotel staff to go to bed at a reasonable time, and amused himself for the intervening time by jumping on all the beds until he found the bounciest. The others arrive and park up. With reception closed, there is a concern that they lack a hotel car pass. To solve this problem, they display a 1.5 meter square Rotaract banner on the dashboard, that they happened to bring along. That should, it was considered, indicate who they are with. After locating their rooms, they descend into the Christmas room. This is a lounge by the lobby which the hotel normally only opens at Christmas, and they leave it decorated for such. Despite it being early November, the room had, for this weekend (as the previous year) been opened specially. (Debenites are good at coming up with explanations that cover the available facts). Sitting themselves down by the Christmas tree, Mark, John and Michelle take note of the fact that this is the second dose of Christmas they've had this year. The first being at the previous RGBI event; Banbury Camping. They see in the early hours of the morning getting in some training for the next night. ie drinking their way through a bottle of Baileys and making headway into some wine. Pleasant conversation is punctuated by grunts of effort from Claire and Mark as they stuff a rubber chicken with chocolates.

The chicken should, perhaps, be explained. There had been a request that people bring an item, which was representative of their district, for a charity auction. Initial thoughts had included auctioning Michelle, but no one could quite decide on the wording of exactly what the winner would get, so they decided on the chocolate filled chicken. Both components of which were quite representative of the Ipswich club.

Christmas is a time for miracles, and the short stay in the Christmas room had clearly helped as all five friends managed to get themselves up in time for a 9.30 breakfast. Sue Burnette - mother of Rotaractor Lisa, and head lady of the hotel - introduced Deben to a Bournemouth Rotaractor, Jo. "These are the people who wrote about my daughters being in a lesbian relationship with each other", she says cheerfully. Jo backs away slowly. The guys wait in the Christmas room for the girls to get ready. Soon (not strictly an accurate word . see last sentience) all five head into town, looking in ski shops and the like. Lunch is taken in the Tap & Hobbit pub. This visit should be noted for two toilet related things. First; In both the ladies and gents, there were vending machines which sold (batteries included) vibrators. 'The perfect gift', as stated in the gents. The second incident of note involved some random woman deliberately showing her breasts at Claire and Michelle while they were in the ladies. Dan and the others explained very carefully to the girls that that sort of thing does not, ever, happen in the gents. And this is generally considered a good thing. During all of this, four more from Deben have been making their way South West across the country. Petes sporty Celica having been abused greatly by the necessity of getting two people sat in the back seats for more than 5 minutes. Vishal and Justin had graciously allowed Geri to take the front seat, and four hours later found they were unable to move. In an almost immediate contradiction to this last statement, they all checked into the hotel and went for a wander round Bournemouth. Like moths to a flame, the gang found themselves at the Bournemouth mini-golf course fore 18 holes of minor manic mayhem. Meanwhile, the girls manage to find the most grim and grimiest pub in Bournemouth. This author acknowledges that a full comparison survey was not undertaken, but it would have taken some beating. Which is what appeared to of happened to the pub. Leaving the others to start getting drunk enough for their later fancy dress, Mark heads out to meet the more sophisticated half of the Deben club who were, when he caught them up, about to tee off on the 8th hole.

When it comes to knocking balls about, Geri is clearly the expert. Beating all the guys and coming in with the lowest number of strokes (other than Mark, but as Geri had played twice as many holes, he graciously stood down his victory). Pete and Vishal were clearly experts at the game though, scoring three holes in one between them. Drawing their new found sports careers to an abrupt stop, the group made their way to the pub to meet the others.

Imagine, in the Olympics, by the swimming pool, there is a ladder, reaching near to the roof, with a short plank, where competitors would walk, and prepare to jump off, into the pool. See in your mind, the athlete slipping, falling off, banging their head on the plank, and belly-splashing into the water. It was this kind of Olypmically scaled, yet nationally embarrassing dive that the five golfers now entered. Several other Rotaractors from various clubs had already joined the Deben crowd, as had Ian, the final addition from Ipswich. Despite this Geri and Mark left for the hotel on grounds of taste. Vishal also went back with them. Some of those who stayed, notably John, made great headway in "enhancing their courage" ready for the evenings plan. This was the night of the RGBI Back to Front party and things were bound to be a little. reversed in places. Much persuading and cajoling had convinced Mark, Dan, Ian and Pete to wear dresses for the evening. Much alcohol had convinced John, and no effort at all had persuaded Vishal. A sense of fair play had convinced Claire and Michelle to wear suits. But Justine and Jerry insisted that they would be doubly back to front if they wore their own genders clothes. This is because they frequently cross dress at home, and in the office. A curious note, is that when three of the guys had been trying on dresses a few days earlier, Michelle kept having to tell Dan and Mark off for putting them on back to front. Pete, worryingly, seemed instinctively to never make this mistake. No one pointed out to Michelle that she had previously turned up to a Rotary charter night in a back to front dress, and only noticed half way through.

But this evening, no such foolish mistakes were to be made. And after a little checking in front of the mirror, the five male transvestite Rotaractors were all looking very glamorous. Well, perhaps glamorous is overstating it, but they did at least know how to sit down in a proper lady-like way. The two Suffolk suit-wearers had, to avoid looking too odd, decided to wear makeup. This completely failed to achieve their stated aim as ties and waistcoats do not work with makeup. And so, with only the slightest mutterings about the lack of pockets, the ten friends from the North (relatively) went down to dinner.

Attracting the usual mixture of laughs, stares, incredulity and double takes that Deben are used to, the gang settled down at their table. The after-dinner mints were already in front of them, and following a brief farewell speech by their hosts, the cheese and biscuits arrived. Between each course, there was the now customary RGBI 'guys move two places to the left', the twist this time being that if there was no 'left' on your table, then you moved to the next one. So, once the deserts were finished John, who's courage had reached almost toxic proportions, was helped to one table, while Pete moved to another. It is one thing to be a man in a dress amongst a group of others... but quite another to find yourself on an unfamiliar table. But our two fellows managed sterling jobs. Pete adjusted his shoulder straps and got on with introducing himself, while John was barely aware he was even in a dress, and cheerfully raised a glass to his new companions. Being an RGBI event, Deben Rotaract were not the only ones to be dressed a little strangely. Several people, including Lisa Burnett, Adam Hunter, and Stuart Yeo had gone for the 'putting their clothes on back to front' approach. RGBI Leading-Lady Claire Mercer had taken the original approach of wearing her dress inside out. Richard (the nice Rotarian who lets us run wild in his hotel) had, as if he was in Deben, worn a dress. While the Ipswichian boys brigade had gone for beauty and elegance (gone for, if not actually brought back), Richard appeared to have stepped straight out of a pantomime. [Oh no he hadn't - Ed] They say the clothes maketh the man. There is some truth in this, as all of the Deben guys found themselves picking up feminine traits from just wearing the dresses. Before long they were talking inanely and unable to tell right from left. Michelle, meanwhile, was belching loudly and telling dirty jokes, so was clearly unaffected by the change of outfit. [Authors note: This is just going to write itself!] [Editors note: Deben Rotaract accepts no responsibility for any offence caused by this article] Of the various Deben outfits, it was generally agreed that Petes dress looked great on him (NB: this is not the same as Pete looking great in the dress) and that Dan pulled off a very elegant figure. But it was Vishal who was actually, repeatedly, mistaken for a woman. Not necessarily a woman that anyone would want to pull, but a woman none the less.

After the starters were finished with (Ian and Michelle still not having learned to use cutlery), there was a short speech of welcome (and several longer ones covering other subjects). Then there was a short round of 'Happy Birthday' as a cake was brought in. All the Deben people cheerfully joined in with this, including Geri who was mildly surprised when the cake was placed in front of her. Her birthday was in fact the next day, but her friends weren't going to miss an opportunity as embarrassing as this, were they?

By now, the various party goers had got the hang of their newfound clothes. Pete, in order to maintain respectability, had to continually adjust his shoulder straps. Mark had to keep tipping the velvet ends of his dress away from any gentlemans stares. And John was many units past maintaining any resemblance of respectability. As the dinner began, the various guests skirted on down to the bar and dance floor. Here Claire would spend much of the night dragging various people up to dance. The only problem with this was she spent more time coming back to the bar area to grab the next volunteer that she herself rarely quicked a step of dance. The natural effect of her not being there to dance with people who had been summoned for this purpose, meant there was an rotating circle of people, moving up to dance with her, and returning alone. Claire took a short break from her attempts at a perpetual motion machine... and returned wearing Petes dress. One by one the guys stripped out of their fancy frocks, and returned to a more normal state, presumably to feel more at home in the ballroom. Which was a shame, as when Mark was called up for his winning raffle ticket, he was no longer suitable dressed to collect his new ladies watch. Bournemouth Rotaract were, of course, the luckiest people present, as they won some chocolate with a poultry theme. Although they did then struggle to get the chocolates out (and indeed, to understand why they were in there in the first place). The evening continued. With more, and finally less dancing. With more, and finally less drinks. With more, and even more slurred speech. As Geri said her goodnights and headed towards the stairs, an impromptu corus of Happy Birthday started up. She was last seen covering her ears and ascending the stairs at record speed. As the night reached those hours which only advanced mathematics claim to be real (few people have experienced them first hand), the remaining Debenites realised they were also the remaining Rotaractors. As they too headed up, Michelle was heard haggling with Sue as to what time Sundays breakfast could be delayed to... Epilogue; The next day, John was... feeling unwell. Claire had to break her journey home with a 2 hour sleep in a service station. Justin and Vishal had to be crowbarred out of the back of Petes car. And it was weeks before everyones borrowed clothes finally made their way back to their rightful owners.

Quotes (aka 'This real bit') "It's quite nice not having people coming up behind you" - Geri "Yes, no, er, maybe. I don't know" - Pete "Stop checking out her bottom and start checking out her legs!" - Mark to Michelle "You cannot beat a dessicated corpse for comedy value" - John "I love being drunk" - Michelle (1.38pm) "I love money" - Claire "You might be bitch-slapping the wrong woman" - Justin "Where did you get the chocolate cake?" - Alex "I'm sleeping with the birthday girl" - Justin *pause* "He doesn't mean me!" - Mark "My legs are the longest bit of me" - Claire "Give away the pink. Get the leather" - Mark "Pete seems magnetically attracted to your balls" - Geri to Justin "If I put them in, then you put your fingers down" - Claire to Mark " 'Give away the pink. Get the leather'; Mark's rules for like" - Justin "Just you two get naked then; That way it won't be purvey" - Mark to Claire & Michelle "I don't remember anyone saying anything stupid" - Ian For shorter descriptions about some of our past events, click here For full writeups of some of our other trips, enjoy; The RGBI Conference 2007 - A weekend in Watford, with Christmas Down Under and Miss Rotaract UK. Back To Front 2006 - Not an event to get cross when dressing up. Holiday in Amsterdam - Forign travel, to a city of culture. And a cool Red Light district. Banbury Camping 2006 - Christmas comes early! The Mountain Challenge weekend - The main event. 24 hours of up and down the hills. The Mountain Challenge training week in the Lake District. Getting fit for the Mountain Challenge. The RGBI Conference 2006 in the Lake District. Treasure hunt pubcrawls, presentations by Deben and the Aliens of Rendlesham Forest. The Superhero Charity Pubcrawl raised money for our Mountain Challenge Sightsavers project. The Back to Front party took Deben to Bournemouth. With lots of other Rotaractors we did stuff backwards. Banbury Camping 2005 brought 200 Rotaractors and friends together for a weekend of fun and campness. The RGBI Conference 2005 was in Bristol, and Rotaractors from all over the UK met up for the annual conference. A serious weekend, with spacehopper races. Messing Around in Boats - Debens trip on the Norfolk Broads. We'd love to hear from you if you are interested in coming to an event, or if you are a local charity or community project and would like our assistance. We'd also like to hear from you if you have any feedback on the web site. Deben Rotaract contacts: Email: enquiries@debenrotaract.org.uk Call Dan on 07740165109 or Tash on 01473721153 .