Year in Review 2011: Dave Abe

With barely a day to go before the end of the year - as we’re putting the finishing touches to our own rundown of 2011 - we caught up with Etsu’s Dave Abe to get his take on Liverpool’s 2011 high- and lowlights.

The city’s been packed with rather brilliant events and goings on this year. What were your personal highlights?

This is such a great city for events and so this is a hard one to choose, but I’m going to say seeing the large cruise ships on the Mersey particularly seeing the Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary II.

And how about professional highlights? Was there anything you were particularly pleased with?

I was very pleased with the support shown to us following the Earthquake and Tsunami in Japan.

We held a Japan Fun Day back in May and the support shown to us helped us raise almost £9,000 which is going to a charity called Ashinaga (translated means daddy long legs) in Japan and is going to help children orphaned following the earthquake and tsunami in March.

Was there anything that disappointed you, or you think the city could have done without this year?

I was disappointed that there was no fireworks display on the river this year. (Dave is likely to be disappointed on New Year’s Eve too - there are no municipal displays planned in Liverpool - SS)

If you had to recommend one thing - a place, event, exhibition, etc - for our readers to check out, what would it be?

I would recommend the football and Beatle shows on at the Museum of Liverpool - both have had such a positive inpact on our city and best of all the shows are free!

2012′s looming. Is there anything in particular you’re looking forward to next year in the city?

I’m looking forward to seeing the events the city put on to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic particularly as Liverpool has strong links.

Keep an eye out for Little Girl Giant which will be a spectacular event to hit our city streets.

Dave Abe runs Etsu Japanese restaurant on Beetham Plaza.

Etsu also runs the deal on Thursday and Friday and will continue this offer into January.