"After Work Before Party"

Last night there was an event for the exchange students called "After work drinks," and I thought it would just be a typical "happy hour" type situation at a bar. I was wrong. We got the place called "Palais M," which was attached to a high class mall, and there was a huge line-up of 20-somethings fresh from work waiting to get in at 7:00 pm. Luckily since we were there as a group we didn't have to wait in line, and we only had to pay 5 euros (I think normally it is 15). Inside it was more of a club than a restaurant, there was a long table set up with a buffet of various foods; bread, pate, potato salad, couscous, etc. From 7:00 - 9:00 there was unlimited food and champagne! The line-up to get to the bar was a battle however and wasn't always worth the effort. On one of the screens that they had up was the slogan "After Work Before Party".. which I guess describes the whole situation pretty well. At around 8:00 the lights went low and they started playing dance music. It was strange because at first no one was dancing, people eventually got into it though and the place became packed with people. It was just a weird experience because it seemed so early in the night to be partying like that. I also didn't expect to see so many people, but I guess that is the place that people go to after work and before the real party! I wonder how many of them made it to the next bar...