Advertisement
" The kick off Concert in Jo'Burg & Australia v's Germany in Durban"
Tuesday/Wednesday (8-9/6/10)
Excited, nervous, perhaps slightly scared especially if you’d read anything published in the English media in the six weeks prior to the World Cup.
We finalized the last of our packing and odd jobs jumping into the taxi bound for Heathrow at 10.30am. Vicky met us at the airport to return Jez’s jacket lost whilst at Hartley Whitney, a coffee and it was time to head to the gate. With a short shop over in Lisbon we arrived in Johannesburg early the next morning to a bussling airport full of soccer fanatics. We collected our tickets seamlessly and Rob our airport pickup arrived and took us to Shoestring Backpackers. After breaky we retreated for a few more hours sleep. We woke starving, showered and walked to the nearby shops getting supplies for lunch and tea.
We lazed away the afternoon in the sun reading before tea and a movie.
Thursday
Up and at ‘em we had breaky and set out to make some plans for the day. The ‘Kick off celebration concert’ that our afternoon was on everyone’s lips. Unfortunately we hadn’t purchased tickets
and according to all reports it was a sold out and nor we didn’t have a way to get there. Not to be discouraged we gratefully accepted a lift to the park and ride with three lovely American’s on the off chance we could score some tickets. We made it to the parking and with plenty of time to kill stopped at the shopping mall to sort our South African Sim cards and get some lunch. Back to the park and ride we jumped on the bus which dropped us off at the entrance of Soweto Stadium teeming with people, African bands, braai’s (aka BBQ) and locals selling everything from cigarettes to beanies.
We enjoyed the local performers and wandered the outer grounds in search of tickets, only coming up with a family of four who had had their tickets pick-pocketed. Not exactly what we were hoping for! We stopped for a beer and we had nearly resigned ourselves to an evening in Soweto (not overly appealing!), with one last look we stumbled across two tickets from some German’s! Ecstatic we made our way in with the Germans just to be sure the tickets were legit. We were in.. high
fives all round! The stadium was far from full but it was just after four, we grabbed some beers and joined the rest of the crew in the outer-circle dancing to the local African bands. The stadium packed out for an amazing concert with music from Black Eyed Peas, Parlotones, Alicia Keys, Shakira and speeches included a pumped up Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu. South Africa was very excited about the World Cup! Unfortunately the return to the park and ride with the full stadium trying to leave at once and only two buses arriving at a time, we met up with a POM from the backpackers who offered us a lift back and four hours later we made it!
Friday
We were up early to await our first trip on the Baz Bus to Durban, with plenty of stops and lots sleep to catch up on the day passed quite quickly we eventually made it to Durban in the last half of the opening match between South Africa affectionately known as Bafana Bafana. Dropped off at Nomads we watched the final minutes between South Africa and Mexico before getting a taxi the rest of the way to Anstey’s Beach
Backpackers at the Bluff. Unfortunately the host nation just couldn't get over the Mexican's. After a few taxi hiccups we made it to Ansteys, checked into our dorm for the night and ordered a couple pizza’s to share over a couple beers.
Saturday
We said goodbye to the luxury of the room, put our tent up squeezed tightly between two others. Next, we shared a taxi with Floyd (a German supporter from New York), Oggy (a very typical German) and Blair (Kiwi) into centre of Durban . First stop off at the Casino for the others to pick up their tickets. We grabbed a late breaky to eat on the beach. Refueled with walked into Durban center into the pumping Fan Fest situated right on the beach! Huge screen, bands, sand sculptures and Vuvuzela’s everywhere (plastic horns capable of producing an incredibly loud noise). We carried past the markets, through the Jewish quarter eventually finding the Victoria Market which by three had closed but an interesting walk just the same. We returned to the fan fest for a few beers whilst we watched the afternoon game. We headed back to Anstey’s for a quick change and returned to the
Fan fest for the England USA game with Aussies Jess and Jamie. We kicked on at bar at Florida Road!
Sunday- Game Day
Feeling a little worse for wear we stopped at the nearby beach restaurant for some bacon and eggs and a lounge in the sun. But there was no time for hangovers it was Game Day, Australia v’s Germany. We kicked into gear with a run along the beach and swim.
Before long it was time to prepare for the big game, we changed into our Aussie gear minus our shirts which hadn’t made it to London before we left and caught a taxi into the center. We decided to check out the famous Joe Cool’s which was pumping with Aussie’s on it three level bar. Then we joined the flood of people walking to the game heckling with the Germans along the way. We arrived to a spectacularly lit up stadium, the sound of the vuvuzela’s audible 500m or more from the gates.
We waited on the chance we could score some category one seats (a step up from our category three’s from a groups of Aussies that had ended up with a few extra tickets
but to no avail). We entered the stadium passing the four security checks and to our seats of the corner of the pitch, ground level about five rows back….awesome! (who needed category one’s anyway!!). The excitement was palpable as official proceeding’s kicked off Australia’s anthem was incredible! If there had been a roof it would have been blown off.
Unfortunately, Australia’s performance was less impressive, as Germany’s goal ‘s fell 1, 2, 3, and 4 to Australia’s 0! Cahill’s red card was to set the trend for controversial decisions for the rest of the World Cup and Verberk’s tactics to play for a draw first game was shattering.
Despite the results we were actually at the World Cup and atmosphere was amazing. We found with Tony and Jacinta just a few rows over from us at half time to share the misery with and afterward the game we met with Nick Holmes and Floyd and kicked on at Florida Road.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.096s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 16; qc: 29; dbt: 0.0606s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb