A Faerie Queen Banquet

As I’ve already said, my task is to rule over all Neopian faeries. Believe me, this is not an easy job. To make it a bit less difficult, I do live in a gigantic palace. How does a palace help, you might ask? Well, it looks impressive and makes me appear much more powerful than I really am. When I have to give out a punishment to a pet or a faerie (which I strongly dislike doing but is part of being queen), I seat myself on a throne. Never underestimate the effect it has to look down at someone.

Fortunately, I rarely have to punish my faeries. Most of my time is spent with tasks that I actually enjoy – like organizing the Annual Faerie Banquet. Each year, I celebrate my special day by inviting all faeries from all over Neopia. As you can imagine, such a party is not easy to organise. That’s why I decided to share my secrets with you – may they help you when you invite friends over or have to plan your company’s annual birthday banquet.

The most important advice I can give to you is to share the work. Have you ever tried to count all Neopian Faeries? Let me tell you that there are a lot of them and it’s impossible for one person alone to plan a banquet with that many guests. That’s why I like my advisors, who I can trust to organise the decoration and the seating plan. So far, the great hall has always looked splendid and all I had to do was sit back and watch.

My job is to plan the dinner. Choosing which food to serve might sound like an easy task, but I believe it to be the most difficult part of organising the banquet. Let me share my experience with you.

Two years ago, I ordered 100 Illusen Leaf Burritos and 100 Jhudoras Wraps. About two hours before the first guests arrived, I got hungry and decided to try the food I had gotten for the banquet. With such large quantities ordered, one missing Jhudoras Wraps wouldn’t be noticed.

At least that was what I thought. If you’ve never seen Jhudora angry, you cannot imagine the fear I felt when I saw colour rising to her cheeks as she counted 100 Illusen Leaf Burritos but only 99 Jhudoras Wraps. It took me all my strength to keep her from turning the room into a complete mess.

Keeping the balance between Jhudora and Illusen on my special day is very important. It goes without saying that I arrange for them to be seated at opposite ends of the room. But my precautions do not stop there. Each year, I make sure to serve the same number of food dedicated to Illusen and Jhudora. This proves to be more difficult than one might think, as my cooks can prepare eight Jhudora dishes but only seven Illusen dishes. So far, I have gotten out of this precarious situation by telling Jhudora that her jelly is too expensive for me to afford (and at 400,000 NP per jelly, this is not even a lie).

Fortunately, the Dark Faerie is not happy about it but understands. I would not want her to blast my room into pieces because I did not serve any Jhudora Jelly.

Illusen is more gentle than Jhudora, but that does not mean that her anger is easier to endure. Instead of making a horrible mess, she sits down in a corner and sulks for the rest of the evening. She is far too polite to admit that she has been offended, and her forced smiles make me feel guilty each time I receive one.

But not only Jhudora and Illusen are easy to offend during the banquet. It’s very important to keep the balance between the other faeries as well. Upon entering, most take a quick look at the food to see how many items I serve that are dedicated to their species. I cannot offer Air Faerie Gums but no Fire Faerie Gums. The Light Faeries would get offended if they could not eat their Light Faerie Sorbet and the Soup Faerie would not even come if I did not promise to serve her soup each year.

Mostly, though, I try to cover a broad range of tastes with my food. One or two, maybe even three dishes dedicated to each faerie are enough – with the exception of Jhudora and Illusen, of course.

Faerie Bubbles are always popular. Did you know that they come in ten different tastes? I prefer the lime ones, which, fortunately, not many others eat. Most like Thornberry Faerie Bubbles, which are always gone first, while I have the Lime Faerie Bubbles all to myself.

Nova Pops are another item that must not be missing on my Annual Faerie Banquet. The sweets are well liked by most faeries for dessert – even if I can only offer three of the five different flavours. I would love to give an Ultra Nova Pop to everyone, but at 4 million each, even I cannot afford them.

One last piece of advice I would like to give to you is to consider the fact that not everybody likes to eat meat. Lately, a few faeries seem to have turned vegetarian. Even though I shudder at the thought of not eating Bacon Belly Busters anymore, I respect their wishes. That is why I do not just serve Faerie Leaves Hot Dogs and Faerieland Gourmet Burgers but also Faerie Baked Potatoes and my all time success – Vegetarian Fyora Day Taco. Nobody, whether vegetarian or not, has been able to resist the salad, tomatoes, cheese and sauce inside the taco.

Not even me. That is why I must leave you now. I would love to give some more advice about how to organise banquets, but my stomach is rumbling and asking for a Vegetarian Fyora Day Taco. May the faeries be with you on this special day!

Fyora

Faerie Queen