Last weekend, all roads led to the GT Centre at Oniru, Lagos for the GTCO Food & Drink Festival Holiday-Edition.
The two-day event, which ran from Saturday to Sunday was a fully packaged experience for all and sundry but it might seem as though the children had the best experience with the play zone that offered everything that would later make the school resumption essay of ‘How I spent my Holiday’ narrative seamless for them.
“I can’t wait to brag about this experience to my cousin who will be visiting from Abuja next week, but more importantly this GTCO Food & Drink Holiday-Edition fun time is what I will write about in my holiday narrative essay when school opens in January,” Zoey Okeke said excitedly.
The nine-year-old Miss Okeke who was scooping a cup of ice cream while speaking to The Guardian, further said: “My parents have been buying everything for me and my two siblings. The food, the drinks – I love this particular Ice cream, we already bought it twice and the vendor promised to give the three of us one small cup of ice cream each for free as take away if we return to buy another round but I don’t think mum will allow us to have a third one. She said we have had enough. My best moment here though is the games. I get to play different smart games that I haven’t played before with other really smart kids.”
From the beautiful curated Christmas Village: a holiday market offering handcrafted gifts, seasonal delicacies, artisanal products and holiday-themed entertainment, to the Street Food Hub: where a vibrant showcase of diverse signature Nigerian street foods is sold, and the Live Entertainment, the inaugural GTCO Food & Drink Festival Holiday-Edition which was curated to support communities, expand SME participation and amplify Nigeria’s creative and culinary economies was a total healthy lifestyle packaged experience that a city like Lagos needed this holiday season.
Demilade Adeoti, a lifestyle influencer who called it a perfect place to detox this holiday season agrees when she said: “Whoever came up with this GTCO Food & Drink Holiday-Edition idea definitely knows how to put their money where their mouth is even as a CSR. I was particularly surprised at the turn out. I mean, it’s just food and people can get food anywhere, right? But then having moved around the different experience sections, I realised that this holiday-edition is a total experience in one hub that can’t be compared. Think of any kind of food and drink you want or crave and I will point where you can get it. The most amazing part is that they are not only a delicious taste to remember but relatively affordable.”
