At posh Hotel. There were the usual tasteless stretched Limo’s/Hummers, an Ice cream van, an AC Cobra, various Porches and other tasty motors, a Hayabusa, a trike, somebody came in Daddy’s helicopter. My lad and two of his daft mates arrived on a sit on lawn mower towing two kids go-carts. Classic!
I know ‘this thread is useless without pictures’ but I’ve only got a video clip on me phone of them holding up a large line of traffic put-putting up the drive of the gaff.

I can think of few things more naff than this recent trend for “proms”.

im with cfh, do you live in america?

We had a 6th form leaver’s dance, is that the same thing? No limos or anything though.

We had a 6th form disco too – no limos, no posh frocks, just furtive fun 😀

mrsflash – Member
We had a 6th form leaver’s dance, is that the same thing? No limos or anything though.

Spot on. We’re not Americans, and I’d rather stay that way. All this vile posturing with “Ooh, look at me, I spent £1000s on a dress and £1000s hiring a pink stretch Hummer”. Despicable.

A friend of mine just had his kid go to one of these for the end of primary school FFS

Limos, hired suits the lot – at 12.

Ooh, look at me, I spent £1000s on a dress and £1000s hiring a pink stretch Hummer”

is that any different from the look at mey new bike threads?

We have shirt signing, they have proms. Lets keep it that way!

thepurist, we had posh frocks, it was a black tie do. I had a lovely red velvet dress (well it was 1992!).

You set of miserable b’stard.

I think its great the kids get to go to something like this. 🙂

we set fire to our blazers when i left school

Tbh, my view was exactly the same. I had Proms as the same as Trick or Treating – an American import that has **** all to do with this country or it’s ‘culture’ (for want of a more appropriate phrase). I must say though that when I dropped him off there I thought ‘Well, it’s the last chance he’s going to have to see a lot of his mates and his teachers. if they want to have a big posh do then fair enough.’ I remember (just) my leavers disco do and it was sh1te.
Limo’s and spending hundreds on hiring suits etc etc are still a load of bollox in my book, though.

Let ’em do it if that’s what they want. And turning up on a lawnmower? That’s just brilliant! Where’s the video then…?

As well as house dances at school, we also had an annual leaver’s dance. One year, an inebriated U6th found his way into the roof space of the hall and fell thirty feet through the ceiling onto his head, resulting in permanent brain damage.

I’d rather have pink limos than watch that again.

Oooh very posh MrsFlash – just normal civvies for us, with teachers trying to keep watch on proceedings…

I’m a bit touchy about this as MrsP’s niece has just had her ‘Prom’ – her dad legged it a few years back & her mum doesn’t earn a great deal but there was still a lot of pressure on the mum to fund the whole frock & limo thing. So great if the families can afford it, but if they get the emotional blackmail/peer pressure piled on from the kids it can put them in a difficult position.

to be fair, if they want to hire limos etc, then let them. they’ll have a laugh and remember it for a long time. I still remember our leaver’s dance and it was a good night.

doing it when you’re 12ish is stupid though!

guitarmanjon – if I can be arsed I will YouTube it at some point or crib some pics off his MyFace or Spacebook page (whatever that is) and stick ’em on here.

Lol the purist, it was still held in the school hall with the teachers trying to spot who’d smuggled in vodka and stopping people snogging too much in the corners. Just all with hired suits and lots of laura ashley dresses 😆

Another case of what yanks do and fill our kids heads with we do also.

Proms for gods sake, what is wrong with a “disco”, food and a fumble round the bike sheds.

Pandering to kids wants is all well and good for those who have the money, for those who do not its yet more of a burden and lot letting your kid do without.

So in my view its all a bit shallow

We had a cracking “leavers do” – suits and posh frocks etc at a country estate (but only in a marquee in the gardens!). Some people turned up in limos, some people turned up in their normal cars, one or two caught the bus. Everyone had a great time and its a really good memory that will stick. Call it what you like, it was a great way to end our school days. Better than just saying bye and walking off into the world. I think there are just too many stick-in-the-mud grumps here at times. Just because some people can’t afford it, doesnt mean you have to make everyone else have a shit “disco” in the school hall.

While you’re at it, whats with this wedding thing – why not just go to down to the town hall and get your certificate etc etc. We’d all lead a very bland life so that no-one was offended, if some people had their way.

Bloody hell what kind of school do they go to?! Good on your lads for not taking the whole thing too seriously.

Yep it was my daughters the other day and I turned up to see her arrive with her mates. The amount of cash that had obviously been spent by the mass of people there (or rather by their parents) made me feel very unconfortable, everyone trying to out do each other, the stretched limos, hummers, fast jap cars etc.. complete and utter waste.

I’m all for an end of year / school (for some of them) party but the americanism of it all really gets my goat 🙁

Having a celebration is great but stretch limos, hummers and helicopters??? We used to have a tech dance and spend all night avoiding the fights between Newport boys, Blackwood Boys and Risca boys brilliant memories and I dont think they would be any better because I turned up in a flash motor. The lawn mower is a work of genius I salute you sir.

No-one spends that much, the limos are fairly cheap and split between 6 or so people, fast jap cars are someones mates brother dropping them off. You only feel uncomfortable if you let yourself, you dont have to care about it and any decent kid will be happy just to be there with their mates. Claiming they’re somehow newly “americanised” is rubbish – my brothers school did this 20 years ago just the same. Even my father remembers his school leaving do being a black tie event with people turning up in their best kit and car etc.

Everyone is so **** negative.

Its not about being grumpy at all, a well done party and loads of fun is what life is all about.

But does it need the pressure of fake tans, £200 dress, car hire, ice swans ………….etc

Life in this country appears to be more style over substance.

Lots of people want to be “famous” have their fame, live it up large, now I am not stick in the mud but where will it end, toddlers parties with limos……………don’t get me on the subject of party bags, I’ll be here all day

My sister went in my classic MG and bought her dress for about £40. There were a lot of hummers etc, but some people went in a 1950s bus.

Mine was good, but only because I went with a girl who is now a 6’3″ catwalk model.

While I agree some can go over the top, there is no pressure to do so. I was one of the group that didn’t go in a limo to our leavers, I hired a cheap tux and had a cracking night. Some turned up in rented porsches (noone turned up in a helicopter I might add) etc but I got my dad to drive us there. The meal was nice, the music was good, everyone had a laugh. No-one cared if they didn’t turn up in a supercar, people looked on at the supercars and thought “nice, now wheres the food?”. Some of the girls wore expensive dresses if they could afford it, if they couldnt they didnt, no-one bitched about it (or at least no-one that anyone cared about). Maybe our school was just particularly full of self-confident people who didnt care what others thought, but it was a local state school mostly containing scallies. Some of the worst ones couldnt go as it cost too much – this was a relief for everyone. Some nice kids couldnt afford to go but their mates chipped in and brought them along anyway.

EVeryone is too fast to jump on the “oh its all about style over substance” bandwagon just because people like to dress up and do something different and lavish for an event. no its not, its just people like to have a laugh every once in a while. Ultimately it’s down to the parents. If you think its too expensive to hire a limo – DONT – simple as that.

The ride-on mower is a classic, and is bound to have gotten more kudos and memory than any of the super-cars, but without the limos etc it would not have had its entertainment value. Good kids will find cheap and easy ways to entertain themselves.

our school tried to organise a ‘prom’. alomost everyone apart from the ‘cool’ kids that were organising it turned up.

everyone else went to the park to burn books and then to the pub.

it wouldn’t be so bad if it were advertised as a ‘dance’.

I’m going to source a hearse for my kids proms…

Them and mates in the back in coffins then the final hundred yards being carried by pallbearers..

costs too much, what planet are you on?

my dinner suit came from a charity shop £20 (probably spent double digit multiples of that on dry cleaning it since then)

we had a good bit of fun gettign to school, met up with mates on motorbikes and generaly made a lot of noise on the way in 🙂

coach from school to the hotel, think one group got a limo, cost them about a tenner each.

All in it cant have cost £40 for a good night out.

Suit hire is just an idiot tax. A cheep £99 one will do for 99% of occasions, and if you need something posher when your older you’ll be able to afford it.

As for its supposed ‘ammericanisation’ I’m fairly sure the concept of a black tie dinner and danceing have been arround a lot longer than that.

As for its supposed ‘ammericanisation’ I’m fairly sure the concept of a black tie dinner and danceing have been arround a lot longer than that.

Except now it’s called a ‘prom’ and features tacky stretch hummers etc.

This sums up my view on stretch limos etc – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pphsrO81ga0

😛

I’m with coffeeking completely on this. Most of the rest of you sound dead miserable and are prob on the wrong side of 40.

I had a leavers ball/prom/whatever you want to call it, I paid (not my parents) for a decent rented suit and split the cost of an old school limo between 6 friends. It was the last time I saw many of them and will remember it for a long time yet.

The kids today love it, so why not let them enjoy it? They’ve just finished their exams, a long time at school so why not do something a little different?

Or did most of you finish your O Levels and then go straight down the pit to work?

I think it’s mainly the name that people have a problem with tbh.

Except now it’s called a ‘prom’ and features tacky stretch hummers etc.

Was called a prom back when my parents had theirs, and featured nice big black expensive cars back then. Not stretched hummers, but they were not invented then.

Jesus – people get so tetchy over a name, how pathetic.

The spend for my inlaws on the daugter’s prom (admittedly this is in Canada) was over $1000 for a dress and hiring transport. She had a good time and I’m sure she’ll remember it for a while but in 15 years will she remember it any more than I remember my end of school party? Unlikely. And mine cost me nothing more than a new shirt.

Hmm we had a ball and so did my parents but I never heard of the term prom until fairly recently apart from in American films.

I think it’s not so much the name itself but the fact that it’s part of a creeping Americanisation of lots of things in this country, and the move towards excessive materialism that’s part of it.

Grumm you put it better than I did

atlaz- thats kinda the point I was making, you dont HAVE to spend that much to enjoy it just as much. If people want to, let them. If you cant afford it, just get or rent a cheap suit (i disagree with thisisnotaspoons comments on it being an idiot tax – I’ve worn a suit 4 times in my life since my school leaving, none of those times did the one previously used fit me) and get down there by bus. We spent more on alcohol at our college do than we did on suits or transport.

grumm – maybe its area specific, but we are in the grim north so I would have thought most of the UK would have had it then too. But then Prom was known from america even back then due to films/radio etc so no surprise it carried across. Excessive materialism isnt good, I wholely agree, but suggesting everyone has to do it and now kids cant have a prom without hiring a limo (edit) etc is rediculous. If your kid cant turn up in his parents car and a rented suit and have a good time I’d question their moral upbringing. Seems more to me like a fit of jealousy over those who can and want to show it off – its not very gentlemanly but then its equally ungentlemanly to openly whine about those who can afford it. Maybe ungentlemanly is a misplaced word, “British” might suit better.

was this st wilfreds?