A friend recently told me he was going to Bratislava.

"Stag do?" I asked.

And he nodded sheepishly, because that's why people of my age and my sex go to places like Bratislava, unless they've won a job at the Slovakian Finance Ministry in a special pack of Walkers crisps.

Most stag groups go to them not because stag parties have changed, but because they haven't. The focus is still overwhelmingly on beer, pranks and strippers. The appeal of disappearing to an Eastern or Central European city is that things are cheaper, so you can have more beer, pranks and strippers; and that the party lasts longer, so you can have more beer, pranks and strippers. 

In a way that resistance to change is surprising, because the traditional stag do is at odds with the mood of the times. The premise seems to be that getting married to the woman you love is a dreadful misfortune, and that drinking 10-plus pints of repulsive fizzy stuff and sicking curry over a half-naked woman is the kind of life-affirming fun which your union will put beyond reach. To hell with that. Call me a metrosexual prude, but I prefer being with my fiancee to being in a room of rowdy puking men.

But stag I must, so I've left my friends three rules: 

1)    No strippers

2)    At least one outdoor activity (no guns)

3)    At least one decent sit-down meal (no strippers or guns)

I don't want to spoil their fun entirely, so I've left pranks on the table - though there's an unsettling arms race going on in that department. Now that stag weekends away are big business there are specialist tour operators all over Europe, and in a market for organised wind-ups you have to be more extreme than the next guy. 

Result? Take a guess. This is a bona fide quote from a Poland-based company:

"If you can't think of anything better than having a team of thugs bundle your stag into an unmarked vehicle, have him blindfolded and interrogated Russian mafia style, and then delivered back for a comforting beer and striptease, then you need our Crazy Gang."

Yikes. If that's the best thing you can think of, you probably are the Crazy Gang. I think I'm ready for those strippers now...

words Nathan Midgley

Copyright WED Magazine 2010