³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ

What Gemma Did Next : err the day after recording this feature, Gemma tried out making the meal in her kitchen. She went to the toilet and left the fat for the dumplings on the heat and it WENT ON FIRE! She's ok, the kitchen is ok, her landlord has just about recovered. Phew.

So last week (Tuesday 18th of Aug to be exact) I was set a style related challenge, on Jo Whiley's Radio 1 Show.. So, as soon as Trevor and I had finished the 1Xtra Breakfast Show I hopped into her next door studio, pretty afraid. I was told I had to sprint around the local shops and come up with an summer suitable outfit for a girl and a boy that came to a maximum of £50 each (including shoes!!) and that I only had one hour to do it...... I felt my mouth salivate, and my heart pump just like it used too back in the day before Breakfast Boogie, when I was working solely in fashion...... This is what happened...

Taking inspiration from Tinchy Stryder, I decided to create a slogan tee, for Jo Whiley. Plus I heard on the grapvine that R1's Greg James goes on about Jo's popular phrase 'Welcome Along' .... A dash into photo shop and a cult Whiley t-shirt was born for £15!

A trustee hidden charity shop provided us with some boy's jeans for £6, a super cute pair of high waisted candy pink calouttes (or shorts!) for £3, and aÌýman's belt that I labelled as 'rustic'. The high street provided us with a simple white skinny ribbed vest for a fiver, a sexy purple belt for £2, some trashable pumps for girl's and guys for under a fiver too, and a bargain scarf/sarong that was in the sale for only £3! (Deep breath)... finished the hour in a habadashery for some spontaneous buying of elastic and a couple of feathers.

Got back to the studio within the hour, proceeded to make a mess andÌýorder around ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ staff (Thanks Neil and Pippa!) to put the bargainous bits on...

But I often get jealous when everyone is dressing up!

Both outfits came to under £30 each... phew.

Xx

Carnival mass band Poison lit up my life with all their feathers and sparkles

If you want to know what happened when I got taught a Caribbean cook up, then tried it again at home and nearly burnt my house down, then please listen out on tomorrow's Breakfast show Gem Xx P.S Biggup the cameraman......

Oh well he made me laugh ;-)

Ace & Vis are hosting the 1Xtra Breakfast Show every day this week 7-10am.

Adam Sandler and Judd Apatow's new movie Funny People is out this Friday

Gemma is getting more and more and more excited about Carnival every day this week

Today : she's learning how to dance to soca. Can Gemma's waist take the heat????

See and hear Carnival 2009 only on 1Xtra

Last years Xfactor winner Alexandra Burke passed through the studio today to celebrate her 21st birthday. Although it was her birthday she brought us a gift in the form of a 1xtra exclusive of her new single BadBoys. While she was in we discuss her love of bad boys, whats she been doing on her time away from the spot light and how she will be celebrating her birthday. Listen back to the show and check it out.

.....and check out our attempt at singing Alex happy birthday (and dont watch the cake. Its all we could get at such short notice)

I realised recently that there isn't much that I don't get excited about, so when given the opportunity to learn how to play a steel pan I was involved.

More carnival prepping tomorrow (when i learnt to wiiiiiiine like a professional!). Gem Xx

Shakin it to this morning's breakfast boogie in preparation for for carnival '09...!

Gem Xx

We threw Tinchy a party this morning to celebrate 'Never Leave You' hitting the top spot in the charts...

Hear the interview and the first ever play in THE WORLD of TInchy's new single 'You're Not Alone'

Tinchy takes Ace & Vis on a tour of his ends

Cheeky impersonators Jason Lewis & Daniel Kaluuya take on Dappy, Wiley, Giggs and T Pain....

For more laughs...

This Friday we're getting a super world exclusive copy of the Tinchy Stryder album 'Catch 22' and leaking it all day long on 1Xtra.

Its the first time ever that an entire album has been leaked pon radio!!!!

Kicking off on Breakfast this Friday with Tinchy in the studio 7-10am - only on 1Xtra!

Hey yo!
Its Amy from the Breakfast team, i've hacked into Gemmas blog. I had to. Look at the state of the present she brought back for us from Napa!

We had no idea what it was. Trevor thought it was edible, so I licked it and felt a bit sick. Janine thought it was a candle, so I took it outside and lit it, its not.

I wandered round the 1Xtra/Radio 1 towers taking pictures of people and asked them what they thought it was. I even wandered to the cafe and got some strange looks holding that thing!

The cafe crew are Greek and they informed me that it is indeed edible! So we are going to try eating it by the end of the show. Wish us luck!

Byeee!
Amy
:o)

And so my time is nearly up here in Ayia Napa, I'm glad that I'm finally able to spell 'Ayia' without annoyingly asking Kate from the web team who has her bum glued to the chair opposite me whilst she uploads picture after picture after picture of people having fun, as she continues to mainly document it... Being here for the first time has been an eye opener to say the least, I feel like I've discovered unexpected Ayia Napa offerings, when if truth be told I when I was told I was chosen for the coverage, I expected to experience raving and bit of aggro added on top. Despite the credit crunch,, meaning that the resort is apparently alot less busy, I found Ayia Napa's respect and genuine love for music more than contageous....I GOT INVOLVED. Not only that, Pirate ships,chatting to Giggs about feet, swimathons, 50's style flowery swimmping caps, female champion kickboxers, brainteasers by the pool, Nelson skanking, rounded off with Peter Andre hanging out with MistaJam is not what most people would associate with Ayia Napa either.

Only 1xtra...

I've worked my butt off but had the most fun doing it....

MY HIGHLIGHTS:

Nelson skank live PA at Cameo's night!

Swimathontastic

The Stevenage girls.

How am I gonna get up for the Breakfast show on Monday??

Gem Xx

As promised... A birds eye view of last night...Ending in Westwood dedicating 'Lollipop' to me at 'Club Ice', you just don't know what to expect in this town I tell ya!

What will happen tonight???!

Over n out for now

Gem Xx

Ever wondered what Ayia Napa was like in 1745?.....

Plus I found a another lovely lady in the same bikini.... BIKINIGATE STRIKES AGAIN. Well, her and

Promise to post promise pics, from last nights very, very soon. Keep checking!

Yesterday at Villa 1xtra, DJ Troopa came on over to say hello... and to do some mixing on Mistajam's show. He told me about how he works seven days a week, putting on the pool party, you know the one where everyone goes to skank in the afternoon and show off their spangly range of swimwear, Also the one that Cameo helps put on.. (Are you joining the Napa dots yet?). Once the pool party is finished early evening, he then goes to DJ in a bar and then usually goes to DJ again in club Ice after that too! In Napa town every second step you'll bump into a DJ of somesort, everyone is on the grind, networking and pushing, and promoting - It's amazing!

Pics from last night to follow.. Swimathon + Westwood + Mike Anthony +Ìýlast eve with the Stevenage girls = Another quite random evening here in Ayia Napa.

Gem Xx

Ìý

Earlier on, I gave Max a call to help me choose an outfit for this evening....

This was the end result... try and imagine the hair thing...

Lemme know what ya think.

Gem Xx
p.s Jam's blog bout last night is funny!

Uh oh last night was wee bit OTT...!?.... Everyone was feeling it this morning especially the Stevenage girls. We yanked them out of bed to come and chat ridiculousness with Trev live on the Breakfast show and see if they're mind's was right by playiing the brainteaser (needless to say they absolutely weren't!)...

Gem Xx
p.s Last night I went out with the Jam's with an illuminous colour changing plastic champagne glass that I poured each drink into, danced on a bar at a weird club called 'Starskeys', got involved in the Sambucca way of life, did the Migraine skank in Club Ice and bumped into Young Nate....

People don't just com to Aiya Napa to ahem, 'Bang' or rave, I found a young lady indulging in the arts cutlure of of the resort too....

Xx
P.S Do you like my new car btw?

The slowly becoming notorious Stevange girls, Louise Stacey, Jane and Emma and that we've been following about since Sunday! They let us into their humble abode and have right old snoop and I loved every second of it. Brought me right back to thinking about hols with my friends... We looked at the pictures they'd taken the night before, what was on their mp3 player, and try to decipher the random stains on the apartment walls that were there when they arrived?!!!!

Keep checking the blog for more... I'm typing and sweating like a mad woman.

Gem Xx

What do you do when you turn up to the party trying your hardest to be an individual and some beauty has the same one on as you???!!!

Gem Xx

Few cocktails later and look what happens.. Looks really good though.

Trevor fought his way through hordes of swooning 1Xtra ladies to meet the ledge Denzel Washington. Hear them talk about everything from sports to new movie 'The Taking of Pelham 1,2,3...

ÌýDo you remember that comedian, that used to do ridiculous things and put herself in ridicluous situations for the fun of it?! That is EXACTLY how I felt last night when Cameo invited me to introduce the 'Nelson Skank' to legendary Napa club 'Black and White'....

PLEASE NOTE: the club was at capacity... It was literally terrifying. Please enjoy my step by step guide of holiday humiliation.

1. Do your thang, chat to some peeps and giggle.
2. Start to feel afraid that you actually don't know the people you are chatting too from adam.
3. Decide to do a live PA and get your CD ready.
4. Rub a fake ball head in full club filled with serious music lovers to a song that's meant to be a bit of joke....

THE END.

Gem Xx

p.s Video is to follow shortly.

The pool partyÌýwhere I met up with Cameo earlierÌýwas actually the best thing I've done so far... It looked like we were in Miami and sounded like we were skanking to 1xtra!
I accepted the challenge and wore the flowery pink swimming hat too... oh and of course, started a band...

Okay so we didn't start a a band but we look like we want to be in one!

Over and out for now... I'm off to debut the 'Nelson skank' in Napa at legendary club 'Black and White's' quite frankly I'm pooing my pants.

Gem Xx

P.S Loads more pics and sthhupidness to come I promise.

Fashion Hit's and Misses out on the town in Napa... It's up to you to decide...!

I'm gonna make bit more of an effort tonight I think.... hmmmmmmm..... what shall one wear?

Xxxx

Last night we had a never ending fish based dinner... We disovered tiny weeny crabs that you eat whole (very yummy)... One of them decided to pick a fight with a King Prawn. Grrrrrrrrr

And still wishing you were here...

Gem Xx

P.S Treble T, you were wrong btw - the King Prawn won.

Keep comin back as I'll be posting my more High's and Low's of my first trip away with work and my first time to Ayia Napa.....

Plus keep up with my quite serious mission the get all of Napa raving to the 'Nelson Skank'... Keep spreading the word.

Wish you were here....

Gem Xx