I've been working on this one the past few days, but there's been no time. I'll be seriously catching up after July 7th, when I'm back in Steyerberg (sitting behind a soda machine at a youth hostel in Amsterdam so I can get power to write this. Fun stuff.)
Morning brought crunchy muesli (European raw cereal/granola, basically), tea and plans for the day ahead. We woke up late, and were relaxed, moving and chatting and gathering stuff for the car. We drove the 45 minutes from Goes (pronounced "goose") where we were staying, to Antwerp, Belgium. Parking was delayed as we pulled into, and then out of lot after lot, with already buzzed Europeans whooping "Deutschland!" and saluting us with beers. We waked a ways, meeting up with our host, Ma's, good friends. They were all experienced festival goers, I presume. However, my sis and I took our time moving through the gates, getting our tickets checked, wristbands slapped on, and 50 of my euro's swapped for festival tickets, for use with food and drink. Already, the throbbing bass was audible over the clamor of people, low and constant. As we approached the main stage, the horde of people around it raised their arms in sync, and the dance beat hit, causing the whole floor to erupt in a flurry of rhythmic (or otherwise) motion. I was, admittedly, a bit apprehensive, seeing how much space a small fraction of the 50k attendees could fill up, and we went to sit in the grass for a bit. I watched a twitching man get carried off on a stretcher by a dozen paramedics. We were off to a great start. Our adjoining group, consisting of three women and two men, found their targets for the beginning of the show, around 1pm. He was some Dutch guy (Gers Pardoel, if you know him), who was clearly well known for singing songs that the entire population of the Netherlands knew. And they would join right in, a cacophony of varied vocals that probably sounded a lot better with the burn of a couple overpriced beers in your gullet. We danced lightly for a while, my arms fumbling as I tried to bounce on my feet and smack some nonexistent percussion device or something. The music sounded like you'd expect, all the same and all for the dancing. The brief periods of recognizable pop lyrics were the only relief from the dun-dun-dun, or if they were feeling particularly saucy, unn-tiss-unn-tiss. You know, my style of music. So I was starting to loosen up a bit, and eventually joined in on the off-key Dutch nursery rhymes or whatever. Maybe the dutch just use bad pop as lullabies, I don't know. My sister wasn't enjoying herself very much, with blisters from her shoes and nothing near her variety of musical banquet, so we (I?) suggested we try for another venue, when the DJ switched out for a guy with a crow-witchdoctor's mask. The ones with the long beaks and hollow eyes and all that.
Scanning a schedule I'd extracted from the muddy trash-laden ground, I realized that I recognized two names, coming up soon. At the same time, in fact. Thankfully, the stages were near each other. Oh, for reference, there were at least 9 stages each day, with separate DJ's, themes, and audiences. The first name I selected was Dubba Johnny, who'd originally introduced me to the dubstep genre. The stage for dubstep was, naturally, called 'Rampage', emblazoned with a mechanical skull on the front. Inside was red lights, led screens playing out dark nightmares, and startlingly flashing screens behind the DJ booth. Dubba Johnny (or DJ for short) was already playing some tracks, so I convinced D and my sister to dance with me, albeit reluctantly. Then we were onto the hardstyle stage, 'Art of Dance', conveniently to the left of the dubstep mosh pit. It was stunning, with purples and jewels and feathers and talking skulls. D-Block & S-Te-Fan led the crowd in the fast tempoed thumping bass, and we moved through the massive crowd for a bit before retreating to nourish ourselves on fries. After that I danced with the rest of the two groups who joined us, and then a guy stepped from between two ladies in our dance circle and pantomimed a robot, moving towards me and ironically jerking. Another guy jumped from behind him, and took the robots hand and mine. He paused a moment, looking at both of us, then shot my hand up into the air, and their group, all decked out with wife-beaters and sunglasses, laughed and clapped. I chuckled with them, briefly, and then realized they were referencing my dancing. I'm not a particularly incredible dancer, but as I realized later, the guy raising my hand had done it in a mock form of a dance battle, indicating that I was the winner. Then the robot did a little, and my sister pulled me into the middle of the circle. I did some moves, and then everyone around me was clapping and cheering. The other group was staring, open-mouthed and pointing, and I realized passerby were stopping to look. I smiled and went for a back bend. Someone flipped out a camera phone. Once we were tired, we joined some other tents, grabbed dinner (a Doner kebap, in Dutch) and then it was to the main stage, for the final even of the night. Just following Martin Solveig was Hardwell, and then the lasers came on, green and yellow and rainbow. D and my sis and I pushed through the crowd to the very center, on the cord protector. Some other girls started filming my dancing when they thought I wasn't looking, and I flipped them a peace sign. People started passing out rainbow light sticks. The drops, and the lasers, and fire spewing from the stage, and dancers all culminated to this incredible flow of music and motion. Then, just before midnight, Hardwell cuts the music. He steps up to the mic, with 20,000 people watching him, and he says: "For the last song of tonight, because you've ben such an incredible crowd, I'm going to show you, Belgium, the world premiere of my newest song. this has never been heard in public before. Enjoy."
The song came on, rising up to a roar, and fireworks began to shoot up into the sky, bursting in time and feel to the music. It was quite an experience. We stumbled home, my sister complaining about her feet, and fell sound asleep in Ma's living room, but not after I wrote another update. Oh, and I bought some rocking sunglasses (pics to come)
The next day was far more relaxed. We woke up late, ate breakfast outside on the sand, parked much further away, walked under the river (a first for me, to be sure), got lunch at a Greek place and then a pizza place next door, then arrived att he festival sometime around 4-6. We didn't know any bands, which was great because we could sit and chill. The moment I head past the first speakers, some guy recognizes me and cheers. I cheer back, and my sister realizes they were the same group from the previous day. One jumps up and imitates waving next to me, the next a robot. I laugh with them, and the rest sit up and point. Felt like a celebrity, and it was pretty sweet. We headed to some renamed places, mostly the same, and then I felt like exploring. I found the one spot on our map that no one had been to; this little hideaway with an image of tree-houses and the title 'Cafe Chic'. We navigated our way through the twists to get there, and were suddenly in sand, with tree houses, tiki huts, trees and a full bar. The DJ there was actually dropped some great house stuff, in this little locale displaced fromt he rest of the festival. There was even a climbing wall and slide. My sister loved it, and we started dancing in the small gathering of other wanderers who'd discovered our miniature paradise. There were more videos taken, one by Ma, and my sister rocked out on a stump for a long while. It felt like our dance parties at home, with some older folks, and bare feet, and just...better everything. The music was so funky and unique that at one point, a drop hit and a live saxophone player stepped into the crowd, soloing, amplified with the rumba-style sound. My sister said he had a dragonfly on his back. Anyways, we came back just in time to see Nicki Romeo finish up the night on the main stage, with more fireworks and even crazier laser shows. I picked up my sister on my shoulders, high above the crowd, and she whooped with her fists in the air. She said it was the first time she'd been carried like that since she was 5. I laughed, and we made our way home to a good nights sleep.
If you want any more info on the festival, check it out here.
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