Day 65 - Formula 1 and Maroon 5

CAUTION: This post contains even more pictures and videos than yesterday !

WHAT A DAY. When we arrived at the Marina Bay promenade, we thought wow this is already crowded. At around 4 p.m., a first race of tuned compact cars was scheduled. The organisation was great, as this is already the eighth Grand Prix in Singapore. Like miracle there was neither a thunderstorm nor significant haze today - our steady companions during the last two weeks. Sweating from the burning sun, we sat on one of the podiums before exploring the area. What a location, between old colonial buildings, lots of high-rise business buildings, the Singapore Flyer ferris wheel, and the Marina Bay Sands hotel with the ArtScience Museum on the other side of the bay.

This is where Maroon 5 will play later tonight. I'll tell you more about the white fence you see next to the stage.

The next race was one of tuned Porsche cars (see the video below) - already a little louder and faster than the tuned compact cars.
 

Since turns are most interesting, we went to the turn after the high-speed stretch along the bridge. Yes, it can be much louder and much faster than tuned Porsches - the Formula 1 practice session lasted one hour. 

This is where we watched the "practice" of
F1 cars. The awesome Marina Bay Sands
in the background.

Must have been hard to take pictures at this speed level (my father took it)

After the practice session, we grabbed some food and joined the thousands picnicking on the Badong lawn. Too bad that the organizers maximized their income by not allowing visitors to bring any food into the circuit area. Spoiled by cheap eating in Singapore's food centers, we found the food prices quite expensive. At the end, they were however not higher than regular fast food back in Switzerland.
Trying to find a place where the cars run really fast, we watched the one-hour qualifying session from the bridge - a long straight stretch where the cars accelerate to 300kmh and more. As the cars fought for fast lap times instead of race positions, "watching" meant constantly moving our heads from left to right, left to right, left right left right and left right - 18 times every two minutes. After 30 minutes, our ears already got a little numb so that we decided to head to the stage area to secure a not-too-bad viewing spot for the concert.
 

The picnic lawn between qualifying and concert. Quite crowded - But this is
nothing in comparison to what awaited us later.

 

The area in front of the stage was divided into two zones. In the "fan zone" directly in front of the stage, people gathered already seven hours before the concert started, sweated the entire afternoon (in the sun) and evening and watched the racing action on big screens to the left and to the right of the stage. That area was closed some time before we arrived.
Two hours before the concert was scheduled, the rest of the large lawn constantly filled up with people. We decided not to sit down some 100 m away from the stage, but instead join a standing crowd at the fence that separated the areas.
In the picture below you can see the situation at the little, 2 meter gate between the big lawn and the fan zone. The two "tall" people are security guards that were screaming "DON'T PUSH! HANDS UP!" into the crowd, and illuminating the people below with torches to see what they were carrying. Oh my gosh, you didn't even had to move your feet, you were jammed and "walked" with the stream automatically, I swear! No place for claustrophobic persons or people who aren't too touchy-feely, no way. A couple next to me was quite fighting against the crowd, the boyfriend tried to rescue his shorty girlfriend from getting drowned in the masses. Lucky me with my 1.80, otherwise I would have been lost (because my father moved more strategically and passed the gate before me). You almost couldn't lift your hands for the security check, because you were so jammed. It really was confusing and frightening, even for me.

Above the situation on the concert lawn in the fan zone. This literally is more than one hour before the beginning of the concert at 11:30 p.m.! We were jammed together, watching the last laps of the qualifying race on the two big screens on the two big screens. It's amazing how many people were standing in such a small space. And, how could it be different, we were the standing behind the only fidget of the whole audience. He kicked my bag with his butt, and I almost lost my camera because of his head, he shook ("danced") so hard. His make-up girlfriend instead stood still like a rock. But, as we all know, opposites attract.

And how everybody began to applaud, when the stage lights illuminated. And how everybody yelled when Adam appeared on stage. And how everybody screamed when Adam was seen on the big screens! What a pity that he just shove his head really short ;-)

The concert in key words:

• awesome interaction with the audience. 
• awesome songs.
• awesome song bridges.
• awesome bass sound.
• awesome that he undressed his hawaii shirt.
• awesome how he introduced the whole band.
• awesome how repeated the guitar in the introduction.
• awesome how high he can sing.
• awesome that they played all my favorite songs.
• awesome light show.
• awesome how loud it was.
• awesome good performance.
• awesome how they sang a cappella Payphone.
• awesome how the audience sang along.
• awesome how far away he actually was.
• awesome how near we actually were.
• awesome how much I could see.
• awesome drums closed the actual concert.
• awesome that the audience first yelled "we want more!" and then sang the Daylight melody all together and convinced the band to perform three bonus songs.
• awesome how rehearsed the bonus was ;-)
• awesome that they even played Move Like Jagger and Sugar as the last tracks.
• awesome that we were part of that performance.
• awesome that a lucky girl could catch his sweat towel (yummie).
• awesome that he finally even undressed his tank top ;-)

Enjoy the pictures and videos.

 

 

Here we were singing all together for the bonus:

 

After such a noisy day, you learn to appreciate silence again. It seemed to be particularly silent on your way home at 2 a.m. Gosh, how my feet and back hurt, but it was certainly worth it! :-)