Interview With a Refugee. Destination: Freedom Author Lily Amis Tells All

Posted on September 3, 2015 by Catherine Balavage

Author Lily Amis

What inspired you to write the book?

When I went through difficult times as a teenager in my early years in Switzerland, I always knew that I would someday share my story with others. I just felt that what my mom and I were experiencing as war-refugees was beyond normal and that I had to become the voice for other silent suffers like us. I felt it was my duty to share our story.

Also as a teenager drawing and painting was my way of self-therapy. But through long-term unemployment the older I got the more writing became my way of self-therapy.

You experienced many setbacks. Some were because of war, bureaucracy and medical reasons. What was the hardest and what did you learn from it?

The hardest setbacks were and still are dealing with bureaucracy. As a kid I was an outsider as a refugee. Than the older I got I felt unwanted as a foreigner. And today as an adult I still feel unwanted and not integrated because of stupid bureaucracy.

That’s why I always say once a refugee, always a refugee. Once a foreigner, always a foreigner. The problem is that I feel homeless and lost. Even though I speak fluent German, Swiss German, English and Farsi where ever I go, I feel invisible, like nobody takes notice of me.

I learned from early years on to fight for my right and this hasn’t stopped until now and yet. I’m still fighting for my right, for my freedom and my acceptance!

You use Asiacity and EUcity instead of the names of the countries. Why is this?

I used Asiacity for Iran because unfortunately I feel specially these days when you say you’re Iranian you have to deal with injustice and discrimination. People have a negative view on my birth country. They believe what they see and hear by the Media and think my country is evil.

To be honest I was afraid that readers wouldn’t show interest in my story because they don’t like my country. Which is a shame, because my birth city Tehran is actually a great city and Iranian people are the most loving, friendly and helpful people.

I used EUcity for Swiss because I didn’t want to point my fingers out on Swiss and blame them for what the refugee law has done to us. Because the law is similar in most European countries and our suffer could have happen anywhere else to. And we see that now more than ever daily on the news.

What do you think of the current migrant crisis?

There are no words to describe my feelings. I have mixed feelings. I watch the news daily and it breaks my heart to see so many desperate people, young, old, families, children coming to Europe with completely false hopes and expectations. They have NO idea that becoming a refugee basically means giving up on your life, your future, hopes, dreams and goals. You leave your identity, pride and dignity behind for NOTHING in return.

It is also the prove of Karma. Twenty-eight years ago my mom and I left our home because of war. And nobody showed any compassion. Instead we were punished with bureaucracy.

Today Millions of refugees are coming from all kinds of countries and finally EU has to act and the Refugee Law has to change. The governments finally realize that the Refugee law as it was until now can’t function any longer. They have to find a fast and human solution to integrate these people in EU ASAP. That was what I always wanted to achieve with my story: Change the Refugee law which is now happening by a higher power.

Should people use the term refugee rather than migrant?

I don’t understand why people make such a big issue out of these two words. For me a refugee is someone who’s fled from war to stay alive. For me these people are war-refugees who have lost everything they have because of war.

Than we have economic-refugees. For example people from East Europe. They have not much and wish to have a better life and future. Which is absolute legitimate. After all we all are just short visitors on planet earth and should have the same rights for a happy life.

For me Migrants are people who have a life. But for whatever reason they decide to leave their home country and start a new life in another place. They do it legally with Visas by Embassies.

So in other words all the people that we see now coming are Refugees and not Immigrants. Why? Because they have lost their existence and have no place to go back to.

What got you through the tough times?

My mums devoted Love, support, care and believe. She’s an incredibly strong woman. I admire her strength and trust in God. Also my art work was a big help. Drawing and painting was my way of getting through tough times.

I have two examples that I like to share with you. Both were done in 1996, the original size is 50X70 cm. One is expressing that my only hope to ever feel Freedom is death! And the other one is expressing how I felt as a Refugee in Switzerland.

What can be done to help refugees?

I waited for this question for twenty-eight years. The refugee law must be updated ASAP. It can’t go on like this anymore. Toying with peoples destinies must take an end. The whole process of taking or not taking refugees in must be handled faster and fair. And finding a human solution is easier than the EU believes.

Depending on the country the people are coming from and why the decision whether to take them in or not can be done in a short matter of time. It shouldn’t take fifteen years to get a proper residence permit like in our case. It shouldn’t be necessary to get married without Love just to be able to have rights.

And when the EU countries accept these people they should give them a fair chance for a normal life and future. First of all treat them with respect and not like a disease. Understanding, caring, compassion and support MUST be the main priority.

Secondly when they start a life in a new country, they should have all the possibilities that are the fundament for an independent and fearless Life. Such as education and work opportunity.

Because Education means independence and independence means liberty.

Let them become the next Albert Einstein, Freddy Mercury, Bob Marley, Billy Wilder, Marlene Dietrich or Sigmund Freud. Don’t stop them from improving just because of stupid laws and injustice.

But the best HELP of all would be to STOP the War & Weapon business by reach and greedy countries. Than we wouldn’t have any refugees at all. Every human being could stay at home and live a fearless, normal life without suffer and pain.

You returned to your home country. How did that feel?

The title of my book is “Destination: Freedom”. When you read the book you assume that I found my freedom in EUcity (Switzerland) by leaving my hometown Asiacity (Iran). But actually the opposite was the case. When I returned to my hometown Tehran after fifteen years I felt Freedom for the first time in my entire Life. Even though the circumstances were terrible and sad, I was happy and free. I felt welcomed and not like an outsider anymore.

When will the other books be out and what can we expect?

The second book “Definition of Freedom” will be out soon. It is ready for print in English and in German. I think the readers of my first book “Destination: Freedom” will be very surprised to read how my life continued as a former-refugee.

“Definition of Freedom” is a cry for help and the perfect example of how the future of a refugee kid will look like if EU don’t put an end to the refugee system and change the rights of Refugees. Otherwise the future of innocent refugee kids like me are damaged forever and filled with personal and professional setbacks.

Would you believe me if I tell you that it took me twenty-seven years to be finally a naturalized “Swiss”? And that nothing has changed and I’m still desperately looking for Freedom? A place where I feel home, welcome, accepted and integrated? Would you believe me if I tell you that I’m still struggling and fighting for a “normal” life? Well these are just a few topics that I’m sharing with my readers in the second book of the trilogy.

What is next for you?

I’m hoping to find Freedom in a country where I feel welcome.

I’m praying to be able to breathe and live an independent life without fear of existence and the future.

I wish to continue my writing and use my voice for the voiceless. I want to help other sufferers specially Woman who have to deal with issues such as long-term-Unemployment, fear of existence, bullying, emotional and sexual harassment, burn out, depression, social isolation, loneliness etc. which are the topics of “Definition of Freedom” and my third book “Definition of Love” which I’m working on right now.

Destination: Freedom is a warts and all book which tells the brutal truth about being a refugee. Lily Amis does not censor herself at all. You learn about her frustration as bureaucracy stops Lily and her mother integrating into their new environment. They escape unimaginable horrors and are held back instead of being helped. If they were helped and given visas they could work and pay tax in the country they arrived in (Switzerland). I hope people in power read this book and some changes are made. This book is timely with the current refugee crisis the world is currently facing. An interesting read from a brutally honest writer.

Destination: Freedom is available here.

An Interview With The Incomparable Salley Vickers by Margaret Graham

Posted on September 3, 2015 by Margaret Graham

I read Miss Garnet’s Angel a while ago now, and absolutely loved it and thought it would be fascinating to interview Salley Vickers, the author. At last I’ve managed to find a window in her busy life, and here she is to answer questions for Frost Magazine. What’s more you can hear her talking about The Boy Who Could See Death on 29^th September at the Windsor Literary Festival.

You had an interesting but complex childhood, and felt that you had a sense of some unspecified task to fulfill. Did that sense drive you? Does it still?

Yes, I think it does. My parents imbued me with a feeling that one should work for the general good. In my case, that is best done by conveying my attitude to life through my writing. But also they endowed me with a strong sense of the basic equality of all, and what people seem to like in my novels is finding aspects of their own hidden being there, which gives a sense of being understood. I feel sure this is part of the power of a good novel – the capacity to make us feel known and perceived in our most private recesses of being.

Most of us grow up with parents defined in some way by their past. If it is a traumatic past, it can lead us to have an enhanced ‘political’ sensitivity, in order to weave our way through the rocks. We learn what to reveal, and what to hide.

This is a skill I notice in your books, so would you agree that we authors write out of our past?

Inevitably, we write out of our conscious but, more powerfully perhaps, unconscious experience. The novel I have just completed, (‘Cousins’ published Viking March 2016) explores the way trauma recurs through a family history, even if the past is unknown to those in whom it re emerges. Nothing fascinates me more than how memory, both conscious and unconscious, lives on beyond the limits of any individual life.

You write with grace, but with ‘political’ care, holding back information, and then revealing. It gives an implicit tension. So – perhaps authors are not just influenced by their past, but trying to make some sense of it? What are your thoughts on this?

I am sure I write to discover what I already ‘know’. What we think we know, what we know we don’t know and what we know but ignore are very common human conditions which I often explore. A previous career as a psychoanalyst has taught me to reflect on these levels of seeming ‘knowledge’.

Or are we just story tellers, or both?

Everything is story, in my view. Even science is a series of superseding stories. We are hard wired to make sense of experience through narrative. In analysis the work is to find a more workable version of the story a person tells themselves about their life. A writer’s job is to follow a story that has its own organic truth and is not a ‘truth’ imposed by the author’s own prejudices or intent.

How did you start your writing career? With short stories, or straight into Miss Garnet’s Angel?

Miss Garnet began life as a short story and just grew. I had no idea of publishing it. Like much of real significance in my life it was a happy accident – as were both my wonderful children.

How do you work? Do you have the germ of an idea, spend time thinking and then planning? I ask this because your novels are multi-layered. They are psychological, mythical, in some ways fairy tales, but grounded ankle deep in reality. I believe I would need to think, and plan, and know where I was going, and what I wanted to say to achieve this level of complexity, and present it, as you do, in such an accessible way.

I never never plan. I hear a voice, revisit a much loved place, recover a memory and then let imagination, memory, sudden encounter, whatever accrue around it, rather like the grit of sand that through a nacrotising effect becomes a pearl. The excitement of writing for me is not knowing what is going to happen. I never know the end of a novel, or a story, until very near the end and then it is often a major surprise.

Do you enjoy writing or do you find that starting a novel is daunting because until you have finished it, you have half a foot, or more, in their world? I ask this because once I start, I find that I need to ‘be’ the characters. Well, not even need to be, I am, the characters. Someone once said, that an author is writing their life story so absorbed do they become in the world of their characters.

I love it once I’m in it. I tend to spend the first part of a book in a restless state of acute anxiety. Then once I get over a certain sort of hump I really let rip and can write for very long hours. But your unnamed authority is right: it does become one’s own life story and I think much of the excitement comes from living out a life that is both one’s own and yet not one’s own. I write out of myself lives I have never lived but live through writing them.

Of all the books you’ve written, which is your favourite?

Probably the last one I have written – but if you point a gun at my head it would have to be either ‘The Other Side of You’ or ‘The Cleaner of Chartres’.

Have other authors influenced you?

Oh yes. Many. I grew up in a reading household, for which I am ever grateful, and had read all the classics by the time I went to university. Henry James, George Eliot, Trollope, Conrad have all influenced me. Also Beatrix Potter on whom I learned to read and from whom I learnt about cadence (if you listen to Beatrix Potter the prose is exquisitely cadenced).

But of more contemporary authors, Penelope Fitzgerald and William Maxwell are my heroes. Penelope Fitzgerald did me the great honour of endorsing Miss Garnet shortly before she died. I’ve not had a higher or more precious encomium since.

What next?

Cousins and after that it’s a secret, even from myself

What do you do when you are not writing?

The usual introvert’s pleasures: read, walk, talk to friends, listen to music, go to the opera/ ballet.

What brings you joy?

Children (this is boast but I am reliably informed by my grandchildren that I am very good indeed at playing), birds, poetry, dancing, and I must confess also …. shoes…

Salley Vickers is talking at the Windsor Literary Festival on 29^th September at 7.00 pm. She will be discussing The Boy Who Could See Death. The boy is question is Eli, who is an ordinary lad with an extraordinary gift, or is it a curse?

For more information:

http://tickets.windsorfestival.com/Sales/Autumn-2015/Tuesday-29th-September/The-Boy-Who-Could-See-Death/The-Boy-Who-Could-See-Death

Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes, The Bread and Roses Theatre, Clapham

Posted on September 2, 2015 by Paloma Kubiak

The theatre-goers were ushered up the stairs to collect their tickets for the show, or so we thought.

In fact, we were handed tickets to the carousel, where we were greeted with candyfloss, ball games and a photographer to capture the moment.

Once seated, it seemed the fun and games were over as the madam of the carousel takes a disliking to one of the riders, servant girl Julie, believing she’s flirting with her star worker, Liliom.

He can pick and choose any girl he wants, but he’s captured by Julie’s innocence and openness.

The pair start courting and Julie’s friend, Marie, imparts her knowledge on flirting while maintaining a lady’s virtue within the realms of the early 1900s in Budapest, Hungary.

We couldn’t help but giggle when Marie said a real sign of passion between her and her soldier boyfriend, Wolf, is when they swing hands. She can’t contain her happiness as her friend Julie now has a sweetheart of her own; they can both share in the delight of what love is and the effect it can have on a person’s soul.

But Liliom is a bad man. He goes out drinking, gambling and even strikes Julie.

Even when Julie tells him he will be a father, the audience deeply hopes he will change his ways. But for Liliom, the news leads him to score one last big hit to provide for his growing family.

He conjures up a plan with his good-for-nothing friend Fiscur to carry out an attack on the guard to steal his money. But as they wait for the guard to arrive, he manages to gamble away his half of the money in desperation.

The plan is foiled and the guard laughs in their faces as the money has already been banked; Fiscur and Liliom are shown as pathetic, stupid and hopeless.

Knowing he’ll be sent to prison, Liliom stabs himself in the chest.

His grieving wife Julie tends to her dying husband. Her love is pure and eternal, but deep down she knows Liliom is, and always was, a bad man.

Julie, played by Daniela Ologeanu, gives a sterling performance here – we feel she is truly mourning the death of a loved-one – she shook with fear, with dismay, with hate and with passion. But Liliom’s soul must now be judged at a higher level.

The poignant words from earlier echo out to the audience – no matter what you do or what you say, it will be remembered.

And in the presence of the magistrate, Liliom is asked what good he performed on earth and whether there is a final task he must perform before being sent away for eternity.

He’s given one last chance to show his softer, caring side – when his daughter reaches 16 years of age, he will be sent back to earth to perform one single act of kindness.

A task so simple it seems, but he manages to mess this up and even strikes his daughter.

Written by Hungarian playwright Ferenc Molnar, adapted by Mark Jackson and directed by Mark Modzelewski, Liliom was performed well within the confines of The Bread and Roses Theatre. Indeed there was no separate stage area and poor Julie must contend with some pretty quick costume changes in the curtains behind the audience.

But I feel this adds to the play – the audience were immersed from the start and we feel a part of the set and a part of the production.

It tackles domestic abuse, against the backdrop of the great carousel which is synonymous with laughter and fun.

And the plays shows how two opposites can attract to each other – one pure and one selfish. However, inherently, it seems people can’t change, no matter if they’re given stable surroundings, love or even a child.

Liliom, performed by Torchlight Collective in cooperation with East 15 Acting School, explored dark and light, comedy and death and the audience felt they were taking a ride on an emotional rollercoaster.

My only criticism? This production was only on for a week.

A Director In Search Of An Actress by Paul Vates

Posted on September 2, 2015 by Margaret Graham

Pity the poor director who raises his head above the parapet and publicly proclaims ‘Is there anyone interested in playing Nora?’

If you’ve read my previous articles about the process of staging A Doll’s House, you’ll know it’s audition time. The chosen poster used to represent the internal struggle within the protagonist’s mind …

… but now represents the director’s (Kevin Russell’s) horror as the emails began to arrive. The number soon reached 200. How do you find the Special One amongst all those? Stories abound of some producers and directors abhorring hotmail email addresses, detesting specific drama schools or, even, flinching at the names of rivals on CVs. One famous director is known for whittling the list down by deleting every third email and removing every third application from his pile.

Ask any HR Manager attempting to fill a vacancy in a company – it’s a nightmare .So can it all be that random, relying so heavily on luck?

Ohhhh, yes.

Kevin told me that ‘it’s so silly what goes through my mind when looking at headshot after headshot. Whether they can act or not seems irrelevant. The first time acting gets involved is at the audition itself, but that seems so far away.’

He does, though, admit other skills are required. For him – and this is just Kevin, no one else (before someone complains that’s not how it’s done) – Kevin wants a clear CV, a photo that shows a certain attitude and a covering letter that indicates a little thought has gone into the application. The rest is gut instinct on his part.

Gradually, the audition list was reduced until sixteen actresses were invited to the venue, Barons Court Theatre. Then I joined him in the process, as a guide, a shoulder to cry on and the-fella-that-reads-along-with-the-auditionees.

The pressure is on them: 1 – to turn up on time; 2 – to resemble the person in the photograph (you’d be amazed how many don’t); 3 – to enjoy themselves. We assist with the last part, aiming to create a jovial and inspirational atmosphere.

So – the big news … Drum roll … An actress has been chosen and she did say ‘Yes.’ Her name is Alexa Matthews. When asked she said, ‘I have always wanted to play the role of Nora and as soon as I saw there was an opportunity to do so I applied immediately. She’s a complex character and makes such an interesting journey though the play and one that as an actor you can really challenge yourself with, this really excites me.

Alexa Matthews – Photo by Michael Shelford

‘The audition was lots of fun and Kevin and Paul have a way of naturally making you feeling at ease. What I loved was that Kevin directed me in some of the chosen scenes with Paul and we got it up on its feet. Auditions can be a really surreal environment but instead of sitting behind a desk Kevin and Paul were much more involved.’

Where was she when she heard she had been offered the part? ‘I had just boarded the plane to France for a friend’s wedding with my boyfriend and received the email just before taking off. I was so excited to hear the news and couldn’t wait to get back to discuss the play further.’

The whole production rests on Alexa’s shoulders – so no pressure there. It’s such a famous role, it is natural to feel nervous about the months ahead. Alexa said, ‘I really hope that I do the play justice and that the audience come away feeling like they have seen a great version of the play. I hope that they are tickled with its lightness but also come away with an understanding of the fresh and relevant messages it has to convey. Importantly I hope they have a great evening out and that as a company we also have lots of fun.’

What Alexa may not realise at the moment, though, is just how many macaroons she will have to consume during the run. I think I may keep count… but more on that later.

A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen will be performed from November 3rd to 22nd at Barons Court Theatre, west London. Tickets are selling fast, so if you fancy stopping by call the box office direct on 020 8932 4747 or email londontheatre@gmail.com to reserve seats.

www.newdreamstheatre.co.uk

Facebook: New Dreams Theatre

Twitter @KevinNewdreams

Willoughbyland by Matthew Parker Book Review

Posted on September 1, 2015 by Margaret Graham

Another absorbing exploration of lives lived in far off times from the Sunday Times bestselling author of Goldeneye and The Sugar Barons. This time, in Willoughbyland, Matthew Parker explores and reveals the untold story of England’s lost colony in Guina. It is a seventeenth-century tale of empire, El Dorado and violent rebellion, of spies, trickery and forbidden love.

Parker opens with a Foreword in which he travels to dense relentless jungle, searching for traces of the English pioneers and refugees who fled the turmoil of the post English Civil War years. Were they chasing a dream? Of course. After all, the reality of post English Civil War was not a bundle of laughs with its grief and poverty, especially for the Cavaliers who were not Oliver Cromwell’s favourite dish of the week.

I was delighted to review this book, because it is a period that fascinates, and I have always pondered on the fate of the Cavaliers, hustled off into exile.

In this case, a group of Cavaliers set sail for the Amazon and Orinoco rivers following in Sir Walter Raleigh’s footsteps. They set up a new settlement named after its founded, Sir Francis Willoughby. Thus was Willoughbyland born.

Parker sucks up the atmosphere for us, we bathe in it. We breathe in the scent of oranges, and suffer in the humidity, we begin to understand how the dream of the explorers fades in the face of incoming planters and traders. Things grow more complicated as mercenaries and soldiers follow political dissidents and increasingly the dream turns sour. Terror and cruelty become the norm. Sugar is produced, slaves are introduced …

This is an intelligent and evocative examination of a period in history that Parker reveals as a microcosm of the history of empire, with its heady attractions and appalling dangers.

Prepare to BE there, feel the heat, absorb the facts, and understand the English past just a little bit more. Well done, Matthew Parker. I knew nothing of this, and now I do. Fascinating. Good jacket too.

Published in Hardback by Hutchinson. £16.99

Also available in eBook

One Man’s Everest by Kenton Cool by Frances Colville

Posted on August 29, 2015 by Margaret Graham

You don’t have to be an expert, or even a novice climber to enjoy Kenton Cool’s memoir, One Man’s Everest. I’m a wimp of the first order when it comes to heights, particularly if there is a sheer drop in the vicinity. So was this book for me? Yes – I couldn’t put it down.

Kenton Cool (what a fabulous name for a mountaineer) has devoted most of his adult life to climbing, whether completing challenges, or as a climbing guide. He writes with humour and self deprecating understatement which belies the enormous achievements of his career, the summit (no pun intended) of which has not in his opinion yet been reached.

Cool keeps technical language to a minimum and while I’m sure his fellow mountaineers and climbers would find much to enjoy in the book, there is also plenty to interest the rest of us. For this is the tale of one man’s determination to conquer not only the highest peaks in the world, but also his own physical handicaps and his self doubts about what his choice of lifestyle does to his wife and young family. He talks about motivation and about the hardships he and fellow climbers endure. He writes too of the toll the increasing popularity of ‘big peak’ mountaineering takes on the environment and the dangers casual commercialism brings to climbers and their support networks. Poignantly he also talks about the terrible impact of the recent earthquake in Nepal and the devastation it has caused to a people he clearly holds in very high regard.

I’d have liked more information about how he recovered sufficiently from his ear ly accident – after which he was told that further climbing was completely out of the question – to be able to climb Everest on several occasions. You can’t please everyone.

Perhaps appealing to a wide range of readers is one of the best tests of a successful memoir and One Man’s Everest achieves this. It is readable, inspiring, and I recommend it wholeheartedly.

One Man’s Everest will be published as a Preface hardback on 27^th August 2015.

http://www.prefacepublishing.co.uk

My Stratford Friend – Dominick Reyntiens by Frances Colville

Posted on August 28, 2015 by Margaret Graham

Taking the reader back to the time of Shakespeare and setting the scene of his early years – what’s not to like? Once the author Dominick Reyntiens gets into his stride, he captures the essence of the period and creates believable characters and settings.

I love the way Reyntiens integrates actual names and phrases which appear in Shakespeare’s writing. For example on page 1 we learn that Tom’s horse is called Prospero (an important character in The Tempest), and later on we meet the matched pairs of horses, Lysander and Hermia, Helena and Demetrius, all names used by Shakespeare for characters in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. A man wearing the head of an ass appears as a precursor of Bottom. And we’re introduced to a Robin Goodfellow otherwise known as Puka – a clear link with Shakespeare’s Puck in Midsummer Night’s Dream. This is clever stuff and makes for a fascinating read. I found myself constantly looking out for references to the plays, and at the same time wondering just how many I had missed.

I don’t know, not having done extensive research on Shakespeare’s life myself, whether this is the true version of events. But I don’t think that matters. It’s definitely a possible version, an interpretation of the evidence we have, and a personal view of what might have happened, and that after all is what historical fiction is all about. What’s more, it’s a fast paced well-plotted story. And I very much look forward to reading the next instalment.

Available from Amazon.co.uk

George Clooney, Rande Gerber And Mike Meldman Host Launch Of Casamigos Tequila Spain

Posted on August 25, 2015 by Corinne Tuddenham-Finn

On Sunday 23rd August 2015, Casamigos Tequila Founders Rande Gerber, George Clooney and Mike Meldman, along with their wives Cindy Crawford and Amal Clooney, attended the official launch of Casamigos Tequila in Spain at UP!, Ibiza Sky Society, the rooftop bar at Ushuaïa Ibiza Beach Hotel.

“Brought To You By Those Who Drink It”, the best-tasting, smoothest tequila was shared and enjoyed with friends of the Founders and movers and shakers of Ibiza at UP!, Ibiza Sky Society magnificent rooftop at Ushuaia Ibiza Beach Hotel, flagship hotel of the Palladium Hotel Group.

The private event for 120 people saw guests enjoy Ushuaïa’s signature cocktails, the ‘Unexpected Casamigos’ and the ‘Espresso Casamigos’ as well as the founders favourite Casamigos Reposado on the rocks.

In true Ibiza style the founders kept it casual with linen shirts and jeans whilst the leading ladies dazzled, Amal Clooney in a magnificent gold metallic Vionnet dress and shoes by Dior, and Cindy Crawford in a Botegga Venetta black dress paired with Alaïa heels.

As the sun began to dip and the night began to cool, guests feasted on sumptuous canapés created by the hotel’s Head Chef as they watched the sun set over the mountains from the rooftop while listening to Balearic beats. Fire-breathers, acrobats and dancers wowed the founders and other guests, circling around the tables and providing mesmerizing entertainment for the night providing the perfect intro to the nights later festivities. Old friends Rande Gerber and James Blunt – a local Ibiza resident, caught up over a few tequilas whilst Cindy was ensconced in a fashion royalty conversation with Sam Knight and Mario Testino. Amal caught up with friend, another Ibiza resident, Charlotte Tilbury as they reunited after Charlotte did the make-up for Amal on her wedding day. Surround by their Ibiza House of Friends, at 10pm the party drew to a close and the group moved down to the VIP table to watch superstar DJ AVICII play his resident Sunday night set. Surrounded by Casmigos Tequila, the owners decided to open up their ‘House of Friends’ by sending all other VIP tables a bottle of the award winning Casamigos Tequila to enjoy the show.

The VIP attendees included:

George Clooney, Rande Gerber, Mike Meldman, Cindy Crawford, Amal Clooney,

James Blunt & Sophia Wellesley, Charlotte Tilbury, Mario Testino, Sam McKnight, Taio Cruz, Karmen Pedaru, Marpessa Hennik

The guests enjoyed cocktails

featuring the Casamigos brand:

‘Casamigos Espresso’

‘Unexpected Casamigos’

Casamigos Reposado on the Rocks

Chefs prepared accompaniments, showing their culinary skills using the elegant tequila…

* Grill loin rib marinated with tequila Casamigos Añejo

* Foie Mid-cuit over brioche and jelly tequila Casamigos Reposado

* Cube Lamb confit with tequila Casamigos Añejo, cinnamon and yuzu sauce

* Hamachi ceviche with lemongrass and white Tequila Casamigos · Passion fruit gazpacho with white tequila Casamigos foam

* Osmosis cherry rested white tequila Casamigos style, covered with sanguine orange snow

About Casamigos Tequila…

Brought To You By Those Who Drink It. Privately owned by George Clooney and longtime friend, bar and restaurant mogul Rande Gerber, and Discovery Land Company CEO & founder Michael Meldman, tequila-filled nights with friends is how Casamigos was born. Launched in the UK in March 2015, these small batch, ultra-premium tequilas are made from the finest hand-selected 100% Blue Weber agaves grown in the rich red clay soil and cool climate of Mexico’s Jalisco Highlands for a minimum of seven years. Casamigos Blanco is crisp and clear, with subtle hints of vanilla and a smooth finish, Casamigos Reposado is smooth and clean with hints of caramel. Casamigos Añejo is aged 14 months and has a beautifully pure and refined complex aroma, with soft caramel and vanilla notes.

Casamigos is available in the United States, Bahamas, Canada, Hong Kong, and the UK, and has garnered the highest accolades from the spirit industry’s most well respected authority figures. Awards and ratings include the highest rated gold medals from Los Angeles International Spirits Competition, the San Francisco World Spirits Competition, The Beverage Testing Institute, The New York World Wine & Spirits Competition, The Spirits of Mexico Tasting Competition and many more. Additionally, Casamigos was rated “Excellent, Highly Recommend” by The Ultimate Spirits Challenge, received the coveted 5 star rating from BevX Magazine, “A perfect tequila,” A rating, from Good Spirit News, named “Best Tequila in the World” by Men’s Journal magazine and Oprah Winfrey lists Casamigos as “The Smoothest, The Best.”

In the UK the brand can be found at top establishments like Nobu, Zuma, Groucho Club, Soho House, 5 Hertford St, Chiltern Firehouse and the Maybourne Group, to name but a few.

Casamigos Tequila is available to purchase at Selfridges and online at www.selfridges.com from £62.99

About Ushuaïa Ibiza Beach Hotel…

Ushuaïa Ibiza Beach Hotel is a luxurious 417-room hotel comprised of two buildings: The Ushuaïa Club, featuring an amazing poolside stage, and The Ushuaïa Tower, offering breathtaking views of the Mediterranean. Ushuaïa is dedicated to providing the best outdoor entertainment venue coupled with a modern, cutting-edge hotel experience, designed for the discerning traveller seeking the fun and entertainment associated with Ibiza.

For more information, visit www.ushuaiabeachhotel.com.

About Bedrinks…

Bedrinks is a new brand of Zumos Naturales S.A., a company with over 45 years of history on the island of Ibiza that began by producing shakes, juices and soft drinks, and currently distributes some of the most important national and international beverage brands.

Casamigos is distributed exclusively in Spain by Bedrinks.

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