1. Wide of Percussion troupe of middle aged ladies

2. Close of female drummer

3. Pan of "Chongqing Hot Pot Association Welcomes You" banner

4. Wide of mother holding small child and little girl watching troupe perform in street

5. Mid of troupe clashing cymbals

6. Close of group of ladies raising their plastic cups filled with beer

7. Pan down to bubbling hot pot on table

8. Wide of ladies eating hot pot around a table

9. Pan up of lady raising chopsticks from bowl to mouth

10. Close up of lady eating

11. Wide of crowd

12. SOUNDBITE: (Mandarin) He Yongzh, President Chongqing Hot Pot Association

"Hot Pot was invented in Chongqing and we have developed a special culture of it. As people, our temperament is just like Hot Pot - and we want to make our Hot Pot famous throughout the world."

13. Wide of chefs arranging ingredients needed to make Hot Pot

14. Pan down from chefs to dishes of uncooked meat and vegetables on table

15. Close of ox stomach

16. Mid of chef

17. SOUNDBITE: (Mandarin) Qin Wenwu, Director, Chongqing Municipality Commercial Committee

"Through it's development, half of Chongqing's eateries are now Hot Pot restaurants. Now we have 50,000 Hot Pot restaurants which employ 400,000 people. We have also established 3,000 Hot Pot restaurants in other Chinese cities plus over 10 other countries have Hot Pot restaurants.".

18. Mid of crowd

19. Wide of ladies gathered around table eating hot pot

20. Mid of lady eating

21. Pan down from lady eating vegetable to bubbling hot pot containing strands of duck meat

22. Close of lady eating

23. Mid of tray containing uncooked vegetables and organs

24. SOUNDBITE: (Chongqinghua) Vox Pop, Chen Xinghui

"It looks very spicy but it's tasty and not too hot. It's just like the Chongqing people's personality - we're firey ! Hot Pot is just like us".

25. Close of bubbling Hot pot

26. Mid of waitress giving tray of food to man and pan of man tipping it into a bubbling hot pot

27. Mid of waitress arranging beer bottles

27. Mid of happy men gathered around table celebrating with a "cheers"

28. SOUNDBITE: (English) Wu Xiaohong (Angela Wu), Certification Officer, Guiness World Records

"The people should be actively participating in the eating. Also the minimum number should be 2,000. And the Hot Pots should be no less than 250."

29. Mid of chef preparing Hot Pot base

30. Pan from chef to waitress

31. Close of Hot Pot oil mix including clumps of cow fat

32. Pan up from dish of bean sprouts to man dining at a table

33. Mid of people gathered around table eating

34. Close of young woman

35. Mid of two male diners

36. Mid of bubbling Hot Pot at centre of a table

LEAD IN:

There are all sorts of odd categories in the Guinness Book of Records. And this week, the organisers added another.

The residents of Chongqing, which lies 1600 kilometres (994 miles) inland from Shanghai on China's Yangtze River, tucked into a huge banquet of intestines, bowels, and some vegetables, all fried in spicy oil laced with chillies.

Now this city hopes to lay claim to the record for holding the largest Hot Pot Party in the World.

Tradition deems that in China commercial celebrations - be they shop openings or a trade fair - are heralded by troupes of brightly dressed, middle aged, female percussionists.

And in Chongqing this week, the din was near deafening.

This is because the city held the world's largest Chongqing Hot Pot party - a street "food orgy" - where the dishes of delight included all kinds of innards, boiled in a mouth-numbing spicy peppered soup.

In Chongqing, the local dish is believed to render medicinal qualities

He Yongzh, President Chongqing Hot Pot Association, says that the spicy Hot Pot is said to have a lot in common with the temperament of the local people.

She says the city wants the whole world to learn about their favourite dish.

Chongqing Hot Pot can include lotus root, seaweed, bean sprouts, strips of beef, chicken feet, ox bowels and an array of intestinal tracts.

These are cooked in a spicy soup - and the Chongqing folk lap it up.

This is more than eating - this is a lifestyle choice and social activity.

Behind the scenes, chefs prepare trays of ingredients for the crowds.

This is clearly not for the squeamish.

But the guts and bowels provide the foundations for a substantial industry.

Greater Chongqing - which covers a land mass equivalent to Austria with a population of 32 million.

Qin Wenwu, Director, Chongqing Municipality Commercial Committee says the area has 50,000 Hot Pot restaurants which employ over 400,000 people.

Chongqing Hot Pot is often described as this city's calling card - you should never leave here without one .

This evening, however, is more than a feast - it's an official Guinness World Record attempt - albeit the first attempt in the new category of "largest Hot Pot party in the world".

The judges deemed that at least 2,000 should be actively participating in the banquet at one time and that a minimum of 250 Hot Pots should be bubbling away.

Of the tens of thousands who gathered, the official count is 13,612 eating together around 2,249 Hot Pots.

They spread along two kilometres (1.2 miles) of street and sidewalk - spending over US$ 400,000 as they munched their way through 30 tonnes of tripe and hopefully into the history books.

++++PLEASE NOTE : at time of publication no official confirmation has been released that this attempt has got into the Guinness World Records.

Keyword-wacky -bizarre

Keyword-world records