Just went back from Alfa. Loved the french fries of old one. New look is cool. Easier music to dance with.

Didn't know Friday night was gay night. Many good-looking gays tonight. Why so few lesbians? I'll check it out again. Lovely.

I have to admit that when I want to dance this is the place for me. I am not so old that I am beginning to forget or can't move and being a 40+ I don't feel completely out of place.

I, too, was suspicious about Lip3's glowing review of Alfa, although I'll have to say that Lip3's English is not all that: "Alfa, mostly knows for its famous 80s dance nights..." Mostly knows?

Alfa's so-so, but today, there are many of good to great places to go.

Their 80's Night was the best thing going for them.

I am not a big fan of posting reviews, especially the negative kind. But last night I had one of the worst nights in 6 years since I came to Beijing, much of it, because of Alfa.

I do not go there often, in fact the only time you’d ever see me there is on Friday night, enjoying 80s music.

Last night, however, I went there, because their ad on City Weekend promised free drinks for the ladies from 9-12, and 90s music. I was with 2 girl-friends, so it sounded like we’d kill 2 birds with one stone.

We arrived at Alfa at around 10, and found the place empty. Well, there were about 2 or 3 small groups in the lounge area, but the bar area was deserted.
“Ok, bad sign, but we are here, so let’s at least get a drink and wait a while, maybe more people will come around 11.”

And so we camp at the bar. I decided to start with a Corona for 30 Yuan (decent price), and the girls realized that they offer only a small selection of never-before-heard-of drinks for free. I didn’t expect to have an open bar, but at least 2 or 3 drinks (like whisky-coke, gin & tonic, or a beer would be nice).

After we all got drinks, I asked my girlfriend how is her drink, (because if it would taste weird, we would leave, free, or no free). She said it’s good, so I took a sip (with my corona in the other hand), at which point the whole hell broke loose.

3 fuwuyuans and 2 bartenders gathered around me, started shouting and pointing fingers. I didn’t know what was going on, but judging form their “you boy, no drink!!”, I understood they were just upset because I tried “ladies” free drink. Then they wanted me to pay 45 Yuan, for doing so. We were still standing at the bar at that point, just next to the bartender, so I successfully convinced them that I wasn’t trying to drink for free, but I was just curious how the fluorescent green cocktail named “Madonna” taste like.

My friends thought their drinks were actually too strong, but the bartenders refused to add more mixers to it. But we convinced him to add more ice.

We asked for a manager, but the staff replied the manager is not there tonight. (or they just didn’t want to call him)

\We sat down on the sofas, next to the dance floor and I had about 4 Coronas, before realizing it was 11:30, and the place was still entirely empty.

At about 11:40, a waiter approached us, and impolitely said we have to sit somewhere else, because someone just called and reserved the place for 20 people. We replied that we will just finish our drinks and leave in 10 minutes, or whenever they arrive, (because the time was almost 12, and we really didn’t see the reason to stay), but waiter said that the party of 20 will be there any second, he can’t wait… so we had to move upstairs.

After 20 minutes, when we finished our drinks, we went down, passing our old table, just to see that it was occupied by 4 people. (We were 3 people, sitting there before).

The evening was a total disaster and we felt so bad, so we decided to go straight home.

Alfa’s service was one of the worst I experienced in about 6 years. On top of that, there was a cold draft coming from somewhere all the time, and asking a waiter to close the door, didn’t do much good.

And If you are crazy enough to lose your way and end up in that dump, pay attention to the part of the ceiling, next to the DJ booth, where part of it is about to come down on somebody’s head. (Alfa staff creatively covered that patch with a silk cloth, which is semi-transparent by the way, so you can still see it)

I gave Alfa 1 star, because the music was not bad actualy, and Corona was NOT fake.