I attended the show on the 24th Feb. I enjoyed the show very much but there is still lots of room for improvement. I approached Hasely Crawford at about 9.00pm. I saw cars parked on the sides of the roads and driving onto the grass sections between the traffic lights. I was approaching from the east. When I asked a police officer for advice on where was safe to park or where the parking lot was I got a reply that she did not know where was safe or where I could park. She was the only officer visible. There had been men on the sides of the road calling cars to park on the grass and shoulders. Eventually I went to the west side of the stadium only to find out the VIP parking lot was full. The guard at the gate said to go to the field north of the stadium, where I did get a park.. after a long wait in the now crowded roadway. I do not know if wreckers were patrolling the area and taking cars but I would not be surprised.
At around 9.20 I was inside the VIP area and could see the crowd was very one sided with VIP having a much bigger crowd than general. The floor was covered over in plastic/rubber? tiles which had a few pop up when you walked on them. Women had a hard time with their heels going down into holes and the floors not being stable. There was DJ music until 10.00 when eventually the performances started.
A five minute count down was started to bring in the 10.00 hour. I was about twenty five meters away from the stage while I was there. The sound was amazing. The artists themselves performed very well as well as the musicians and the stage. The performances were continuous for over four hours. There were Spoken Word performances while bands changed equipment on stage. It was well worth the price of $600ttd. General audience area was behind a 6 foot fence but could look at two large screens and their own set of speakers. Many people were in the seats in both VIP and general. VIP could only sit on the western side but general could sit on the western and eastern sides.
There were a couple minor hiccups in the show, all small but noticeable. The show was still great. The washrooms that were closest to the entrance had a line for the females because there were not many stalls and some females started using the male stalls. There was soap and toilet paper in the washrooms thankfully. The step at the top level of the stage was very high and especially tricky for the female performers who had on heels and had to jump to the lower level. A couple of dancers had light up suits that died after a few seconds and they went off stage afterwards. One of the guests was not prepared to go on stage when he was called and Machel made up a few minutes until he came up. The spotlight operators did not always show the performers when they started. At least twice I noticed a remote drone pass over the crowd and eventually stop above the area I was in. I did not feel safe with it above me.
There were police officers walking through the crowd for the duration of the show. Some of them had large guns and riot gear. There were fire officers walking through the stands.The heat from the crowd was intense. It felt degrees cooler when walking through an opening without people around. The crowd was huge and I do not think the exits could have accommodated a surge of people trying to get out if there was an emergency.
I enjoyed the show very much despite the minor hiccups.
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