This post is coming late, very late actually as it relates an event that happened on the 25 September...
For those who are passionate they will know right away that I'm referring to the first trial of the Singapore Formula one grand prix! It would be quite spooky if you made the link before I told you because even I, who assisted to it, would not tie that date to cars going fast, but to Caroline's birthday (hey, how are you by the way?).
Back to the subject... It all started a few days before when I told Tinker that I'd like to see the grand prix, but it was too late to get tickets and anyway $200+ to see this was not worth it. But it was still hanging in my mind despite my striking out the possibility.
Then that Friday 25 September, around 4pm if my memory serves me right, I had a call from my dear wife, as usual on Fridays around this time. I was expecting the usual chat about our plans in the evening. And indeed it was the same, except Ting simply told me:
"I can get tickets for the trials tonight, you wanna go?"
"You're kidding right?!?", replies the Yeti with a tinge of excitement in the voice
"No, no, I can get tickets, you want to or not?", throws back Tinker pretending to become impatient.
Of course my reply was to not wait an other second and we got the tickets. The cherry on the cake was that not only she had one ticket for herself and for me, she also had one for Jimme (remember how I told you to pronounce that? Yehmeuh) who would be a welcome male company in this kind of event.
So the appointment was set to meet a few hours later and head to see the cars turning and turning and turning more... Needless to say I didn't work much after that phone call as I was busy checking the map of the track on internet, the drivers, the cars, and I was pondering whether to go home now, or wait a little to save face in front of my colleagues... I had to fetch my camera you see?
I left about 20 minutes later with a loud smile on my face and a broad "I'm off to see the F1 girls!" addressed to my colleagues.
I picked up Tinker at the MRT station (the bike stayed in the parking that week, you can't imagine how bad to the traffic it is to build a race track in the middle of the city) and we went home. We stayed about long enough to change, grab the camera and left again.
We then picked up Jimme at an other MRT station and here we were on our way to City Hall MRT to enter the arena. I was expecting a large crowd, but strangely not that many people were entering... On the contrary, I wasn't expecting that much noise, you can't imagine until you hear it how loud these cars are. I thought night clubs were bad: I was wrong.
I took the noise for the first few cars, regretting bitterly not to have bought the earplugs selling at $2 at the entrance. Very soon I couldn't take it. The walk to that first shop was long and on the way I passed a Ferrari outlet. I went to the girl at the counter asking for the price of the earplugs with a broad smile knowing that it was going to be damn expensive, but heck I'd still buy them. $10 was the answer with an equivalent broad smile. Mine faded and I walked away grumbling bad words against Ferrari.
The rest of the evening went pretty fast, I'll pass on the overpriced chicken rice, and the overpriced beers and the bad view of the track.
We stayed on the field in the middle of the race track during the break where we enjoyed a concert of Ozomatli, a good band playing raga.
There was also an exposition of old cars, really nice ones.
Here are the few not too bad pictures we managed to take. It was overall a great evening and next year I'll try to see the race sitting in the grand stand!
For those who are passionate they will know right away that I'm referring to the first trial of the Singapore Formula one grand prix! It would be quite spooky if you made the link before I told you because even I, who assisted to it, would not tie that date to cars going fast, but to Caroline's birthday (hey, how are you by the way?).
Back to the subject... It all started a few days before when I told Tinker that I'd like to see the grand prix, but it was too late to get tickets and anyway $200+ to see this was not worth it. But it was still hanging in my mind despite my striking out the possibility.
Then that Friday 25 September, around 4pm if my memory serves me right, I had a call from my dear wife, as usual on Fridays around this time. I was expecting the usual chat about our plans in the evening. And indeed it was the same, except Ting simply told me:
"I can get tickets for the trials tonight, you wanna go?"
"You're kidding right?!?", replies the Yeti with a tinge of excitement in the voice
"No, no, I can get tickets, you want to or not?", throws back Tinker pretending to become impatient.
Of course my reply was to not wait an other second and we got the tickets. The cherry on the cake was that not only she had one ticket for herself and for me, she also had one for Jimme (remember how I told you to pronounce that? Yehmeuh) who would be a welcome male company in this kind of event.
So the appointment was set to meet a few hours later and head to see the cars turning and turning and turning more... Needless to say I didn't work much after that phone call as I was busy checking the map of the track on internet, the drivers, the cars, and I was pondering whether to go home now, or wait a little to save face in front of my colleagues... I had to fetch my camera you see?
I left about 20 minutes later with a loud smile on my face and a broad "I'm off to see the F1 girls!" addressed to my colleagues.
I picked up Tinker at the MRT station (the bike stayed in the parking that week, you can't imagine how bad to the traffic it is to build a race track in the middle of the city) and we went home. We stayed about long enough to change, grab the camera and left again.
We then picked up Jimme at an other MRT station and here we were on our way to City Hall MRT to enter the arena. I was expecting a large crowd, but strangely not that many people were entering... On the contrary, I wasn't expecting that much noise, you can't imagine until you hear it how loud these cars are. I thought night clubs were bad: I was wrong.
I took the noise for the first few cars, regretting bitterly not to have bought the earplugs selling at $2 at the entrance. Very soon I couldn't take it. The walk to that first shop was long and on the way I passed a Ferrari outlet. I went to the girl at the counter asking for the price of the earplugs with a broad smile knowing that it was going to be damn expensive, but heck I'd still buy them. $10 was the answer with an equivalent broad smile. Mine faded and I walked away grumbling bad words against Ferrari.
The rest of the evening went pretty fast, I'll pass on the overpriced chicken rice, and the overpriced beers and the bad view of the track.
We stayed on the field in the middle of the race track during the break where we enjoyed a concert of Ozomatli, a good band playing raga.
There was also an exposition of old cars, really nice ones.
Here are the few not too bad pictures we managed to take. It was overall a great evening and next year I'll try to see the race sitting in the grand stand!
1 comment:
Good and nice post ! So tonight, after the Brazil Grand Prix, we know the name of 2009 season; the initials of his name being JB, I wondered if is sponsored by a scotch whisky wellknown brand? Love to both from Michel.
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