Night of Valentine

By Sam Banda Jnr:

The colours of love of red and white were visible on Wednesday night, a special night on Valentine’s Day as Amaryllis Hotel Blantyre in partnership with Coca-Cola and Times Group decided to give people a perfect Valentine’s treat.

Love which is a beautiful thing had to flow on Valentine’s Day and so, the event in the Orchid room at Amaryllis, a hotel that has kept itself dynamic in giving artists space was well enveloped with romantic doings including a performance by award winning musician Onesimus popularly known as African Butter.

Wednesday being a working day, couples had to make sure they took care of their work matters first and then go to their homes to freshen up and get into the mood of Valentine’s Day before making their way to Amaryllis Hotel.

The ingress to the venue of the Valentine’s Day event was top notch, the decorators scored points – a red carpet, flowers and lights seemed as if one was entering dreamland.

From the entrance one was greeted with a Coca-Cola booth which was well stocked with drinks and then came a stage which was also well decorated with flowers and lights where people had a chance to take photographs before making their way to the Orchid room.

Inside Orchid room, it was also another paradise segmented by a stage where Onesimus served his romantic tracks.

Couples in colours of red and white and others black and white turned up for the event, they were in twos and it reminisced the times of Noah as it is told in the Bible when people and animals made their way to the ark to run away from the heavy rains but in this scenario, there was no ark let alone heavy rains but rather it was Valentine’s Day.

While couples were in dominance, there were also some people, who just decided to come as families and friends to enjoy the night out.

And as the couples were chatting and enjoying food and drinks, Onesimus clad in red and white, the colours of love, jumped on stage.

The artist welcomed people to the sold-out event and thanked them for making it to make the night special.

“Tonight is the night to make amends, tonight is the night to appreciate each other because love is beautiful and love is patient,” he said.

He kicked-off his performance in a different style compared to his other gigs, this time; it was on a slow note backed by a keyboardist and a guitarist.

Onesimus opened his account with the track ‘Ndamusowa’, and he reminded the audience his days of yesteryears when he was trading as Armstrong before he assumed his present name.

While he remained stuck to the stage in his early spells, he took a different approach in his next course with host Super DT helping him out as he joined the audience by making it to each table.

He actually requested men to switch on their phones and start shooting videos of their women, videos that he indicated would be memories and that they can drop them on their different online platforms.

Having failed to hold a listening session of his Extended Playlist titled I am Strong recently due to illness; Onesimus served some songs from the EP on the night including ‘Love Again’ which he performed to couples on each table.

After the slow numbers, Onesimus now switched to his usual performance act where he ended up dishing out songs like ‘Solomoni’.

The climax was even super when Onesimus invited couples to the dance floor and performed some of the songs that they requested and ‘Ndamusowa’ found itself again on the itinerary.

“We have enjoyed the night. Love is beautiful. We had to come out tonight and be part of this special event. We have enjoyed the performance by Onesimus,” the couple of well-known musician Fredokiss, said.

The couple of the Simentis that is expecting their second child also said they enjoyed the night which reminded them of their courtship years.

“We enjoyed the food, the drinks, the music and most of all having time to chat, the two of us together was special,” the couple that was in black and white attires, said.

The couple was even more excited in that the wife managed to earn a massage voucher on the night where women received rose flowers.

Several other couples said they had fun on the night and called upon Amaryllis and its partners to make such an event a routine although they held it because it was Valentine’s Day.

Soaked in sweat after the performance, Onesimus said he felt honoured to perform for couples on the night.

“I had to do it different being Valentine’s Day and I enjoyed every moment,” he said.

While couples had all the fun at Amaryllis with sounds from Onesimus, a few kilometres at Sunbird Mount Soche, there was also a Valentine’s Day event that also pulled the numbers.

Couples enjoyed food and drinks during the event that also saw the presence of Cape Stars that had its spirits on offer.

With women receiving rose flowers, Sunbird Mount Soche turned out to be a heaven of Valentine’s Day as the audience also got treated to live music served by among others, Piksy of the ‘Chonchobe’ fame and Lulu, who made a long trip from Lilongwe.

Lulu was the last to perform during the event that also attracted high profile people.