The Bruno Mars Effect

Now that I'm hyped up on caffeine, I think I can finally start this post. Yeah, sure it's been a while. Maybe even 6 months. But all this shit's happened to me lately (both the bad AND even the good kind, ugh... the good kind), and I just haven't been compelled enough to vent my spleen. But maybe I will now, just maybe I will.

It was a couple of months ago that Sophie decided that she felt like going to see Bruno Mars, apparently he was showing at the Big Top at Luna Park, and would I like to come? Would I??? Alright, maybe it was just meh, might as well. The next thing I know, I'm getting agitated and anxious trying to get tickets on the Ticketek website, and even going so far as to come to work early to make sure I made the ticket release time. That's 9 AM, damn it. I'm never that early. That's right, early. God I've got it good. Anyway, the point was, I ended up getting tickets directly from the Big Top website, NO THANKS TO TICKETEK.

Homer: You just lost yourself a customer!
Moe: I've forced myself to wha...?
Homer: You just lost yourself a customer!
Moe: Homer.. I'll talk to you tomorrow!
Homer: You just lost yourself a customer!
Moe: Yeah you can use it!

Then all I had to do was sit back and wait till the day. In the meantime Sophie bought his Doo- Wops and Hooligans cd, whereas I may or may not have downloaded a few of his songs, if not his whole album. It was the least I could do. Then there was the decision of what to wear, not that he could've seen us in the mass of screaming teeny boppers, but you never know. "You there, with the spotted maroon jacket." After which I can imagine Sophie pushing her way through
the crowd, saying "Out of the way, bitches."

So we met up after work, and had surprisingly decent yet cheap sushi from Sushi Hotaru, which replaced the gift store Japan City, alas. I sort of liked that place. The sushi train was standard enough, but we were glad that we came by fairly early, around 6ish, as there was a small crowd forming outside, and all they could do was watch us eat - slowly, sipping our hot green tea, slurping our miso, and savouring each and every delicious morsel. Not that we did it on purpose. God no.

Eventually we had to give up our seats to the starving onlookers, and made our way to the station for Milsons Point. It was a nice night for it, a bit on the cool side. We got a couple of shots at the Harbour Bridge, and then a few more at the illuminated Luna Park smilie face. There was already a loosely formed line, and it was about 8ish by the time we got in. It was basically like a dark hall, with a smoke machine and a red neon sign setting the scene. By then, it was pretty much filled to capacity with a mix of teens, 20 and 30 somethings, and for AT LEAST an hour we were treated (subjected) to the pre show entertainment, this band called Diafrix. Their music was an odd mix of reggae, hip hop and electro, accompanied by some unintelligible rapping. I was trying to keep my mind open and groove along to their music, maybe even trying to catch a few words, but it was just all TOO HARD. God they grated. Even so, I tried not to let my sheer disappointment show, although it was clearly on the faces of a lot of people around me, and their lack of body movements pretty much said it all, really. The most the crowd ever did was jump around a couple of times, but even then I'm pretty sure it was out of politeness.

Maybe it was a reverse psychology sort of thing, where it was just a matter of building up the tension, the anticipation and in my case, the rage, until people were mentally willing them to get off the stage. Sophie quipped that maybe we should all be chanting Bru-no over and over again, to get him to come out already, and to drop a hint or two to Diafrix.

Anyway, he finally set foot on stage around 9 something, and then we were screaming like fangirls. He wore his trademark trilby hat, and looked his fine self. I couldn't believe it was actually him on stage in Luna Park's Big Top of all places, after seeing him in videoclips, it felt surreal. He played a couple of songs from way back when, when his band was just starting out in bars and clubs (Whoo! Yeah! Bars and clubs!) and the concert had this intimate feel, with remixed and rock versions played, and slowing down with an acoustic version of "Our first time", which I would file in the slow lovemaking category.

There was a mezzanine level, but that was a bit far back, so we decided to try our luck and get as close as we could to the stage without being annoying about it. Which is more than I can say for this lady and a couple of others near us. And now let my rant begin here. Feel free to skim ahead. When a couple of guys tried to fill a space which had opened in the crowd, this lady demanded to know if they were AWARE that there were TWO YOUNG GIRLS behind them who COULDN'T SEE? And because she wouldn't let up about it, the guys were put off and backtracked their way behind us. I mean, that's what we're dealing with here.

SIGH. For god's sake woman, for one thing, no one was stopping those girls from stepping forward into the space if they wanted to, and for a second thing, even if they did step forward, EVERY FUCKING PERSON IS TALLER THAN THEM, so it wasn't going to make a fuck of a difference anyway. If you were so concerned about the fact they couldn't see, why didn't you tell them to make their way to the front, or better yet, the mezzanine level? In case you hadn't noticed, it was a struggle for most people of average height even to see, and you don't see them complaining about it, let alone making useless complaints to other people. And for a third thing, (yeah, sorry, once I get started... I warned ya) it didn't even look like she even knew these girls. It was just a pointless exercise in how to be a whiner and ruin everyone else's experience. Lesson learned, lady.

You'd think that would be it. But no. She had another whining ace up her sleeve, and she pulled that one out when we were all engrossed in the concert, and trying to capture the moment to savour for the rest of our lives. So in order to do that, people had to raise their cameras/mobiles in the air to get a good view, and then she started piping up about how it's illegal and something or other about copyright infringement, to this group in front of her, whilst quite a few others around us were also using their devices. A guy from the group pointed this out to her, but she flatly ignored that blatant fact. I was hoping he'd tell her to just shut up already, but I suppose at least some of us are trying to be civilised. End of rant.

Other than that, we all had a jolly good time, albeit we were vaguely disappointed that the show only lasted for an hour or so, but then I guess that's probably because he's only got those few songs to start with. Which is better than nothing.

Afterwards Sophie and I were making our way home by train, having to stop at various stations to change trains due to trackwork and whathaveyou. At one station we had a bit of time on our hands and we decided to call Vay to pick us up (Vay? I thought the bastard broke up with you? Hmm, yes, about that. Well we realised we both needed each other enough to get back together. And there you have it, in a nutshell). I remember it being after midnight or so, and we were getting cold, and discussing what makes a good bowl of instant noodles. The conversation ran like this:

Me: You know what I like putting in? Ham.
Sophie: Ham? Ham?!
Me: Yes, ham.
Sophie: What, like ham in a can?
Me: No, not spam.

Sorry, I just had to add that in, you just had to be there, it was a like a Monty Python skit. Alright, it was getting late and we were cold and tired. Trust me, it was hilarious. For the record, I like adding ham slices, tomatoes, lettuce, coriander and an egg, which is poached in the saucepan. And that's how you make excellent instant noodles.