Saturday consisted of attending the Women’s W-League Grand final between QLD Roar, and Canberra United, during which Danielle, Jo and I became famous by being broadcast on tv cheering the first goal by the QLD girls. It was a great match with the QLD girls eventually taking it out 2-0. After that, Jo and I caught a free bus back to Roma St, got in my car and headed down to the Gold Coast. We made our way to O’Malleys, and had dinner and drinks while we watched the boys play. This time it was QLD Roar vs Sydney FC. It was absolutely fantastic to see QLD come out on top again, making it two out of two wins for the day. We finished up the night by buying two Australian flag Sombreros, accidentally buying some naked man playing cards (the subject of lots of laughing and near pants-wetting experiences), and having cocktails back at the unit.

Look at those awesome people down the bottom!

**Sunday Morning**

07.00am – I awoke early with a bit of a headache from the previous night’s drinking, so wandered out to the living room. I located the panadol, popped two and had a bottle of water. I chilled on the balcony for a little bit looking at the beach, then decided I would head back to bed for another kip.

08.00am – Awake again, and this time was for good. I charged up my iphone on the computer in the living room, and watched American Hot Rod on TV while I waited for Jo. I started to get really hungry at this point, and went into the kitchen to look for some tea/coffee making materials. The kitchen was severely lacking. I found one packet of instant coffee, no sugar, and no milk. I gave up my attempt, refilled my water and made my way back to the couch.

09.00am – Being a Big Day Out virgin, I was really looking forward to getting there. My original plan was to leave by 10am, as I expected a long wait for the bus and I wanted to see Sparkadia (who were first up). Finally at about half-past I woke up Jo, who stumbled out to the living room a little dazed. By 10.30am we were ready to go.

11.30am – no idea how we managed to waste the last 2 hours, but we had breakfast, went and got some essentials for the day (that would prove to not be necessary at ALL) and went and lined up for the buses. The line up was MASSIVE, I would have estimated something like 500m or more? It went throughout the carpark, around the corner and a fair walk down the street. Thankfully buses were constantly coming and going so it moved pretty fast. We left after about half an hour of waiting.

12.30pm – arriving at the Big Day Out was an amazing experience. Seeing the loads of people walking up the road, piling out of the buses, people paying an astonishing $40 for parking etc. Yet it still didn’t dawn on me just how many people was going to be at the event. We made our way to the front, which consisted of two shipping containers, and gigantic boards filled with computer parts.

One of the boards out the front of the Big Day Out

You lined up to get through, during which time you were looked over by the police, and if you were in the right spot at the right time, the sniffer dogs. It was amazing to see how every time the sniffer dog started on a particular line, loads of people would switch lines. Obvious much? Not to the police apparently. I saw one girl get pulled out of the line, with the dog reacting very excitedly to her bag. DONE. I think if they had two dogs there, they would have got a helluva lot more.

After making your way through the shipping containers you were then led to one of dozens of lines. There were lines for under 18′s, there were lines for over 18′s not drinking, and lines for over 18′s drinking (where you were allocated a wrist band to show at the various bars around the grounds). Your bag was also searched, and your tickets collected.

The lines to get into the BDO.

After you made it through the line, you walked forward into the grounds, past some buildings and to the top of the hill. Breathtaking. Stages and rides, exhibitions, markets, all visible from the one spot. This was something I’d never comprehended. The sheer size completely blew me away. This thing was going to be BIG.

01.00pm – When we arrived we headed straight for the orange stage so I could hear the last of Birds of Tokyo. This was another band that I’d only recently discovered (as a result of going to the BDO) and I was disappointed to miss so much of their performance (although I’ve discovered they’ll be back in Brisbane in March, which is very tempting).

The orange and blue stages were right next to each other and catered for most of the headline acts. I say most, and I’ll get into more detail about that later. The way the blue & orange worked was while a band was playing on the blue stage the workers would set up for the next band on the orange. Then, when the band on the blue stage was finished the next band could immediately start on the orange. The blue stage would then be dismantled, and set up for the next band. And so on, and so on. It worked extremely well.

After the birds of Tokyo finished up, it was then time for The Grates on the blue stage. The lead singer, Patience had recently injured her ankle (as discovered on Twitter) so we weren’t sure if she’d come out walking (or dancing), or would be doing a sit down performance. We needn’t have stressed. She came out dressed in something resembling a toy soldier outfit, and let rip. I only got to enjoy 15mins of their performance though, as Jo realised that Youth Group were on and that was the only band that she was really hanging to see. Given I had a list the size of my arm, I figured I’d better compromise.

Patience from The Grates performing

1.30pm – After fighting our way through the building crowd, we managed to get to the Green Stage to see Youth Group perform only one song. Luckily, it was their most well known song “Forever Young”. Jo sung along and danced, while I attempted some photography. In the end I found I couldn’t find a stable enough position, and after stuffing around with the manual settings on my camera I gave up, and walked back to Jo. After the band finished up, we looked at the map and tried to figure out what we would do next. We decided we’d go and take a look at the merchandise then head back to the Green Stage for The Ting Tings. Big mistake.

We left the tent and ran into mate of mine, Renee. We chatted to her for a bit, then without noticing the swarm of people our way headed to the merchandise stand. Nothing really took my fancy so I didn’t end up buying anything, and Jo purchased a stubby cooler. We then turned around to go back to the green stage, and were stunned to see the size of the crowd. The area under the tent was full, and people were crowded on the nearby hills. If we wanted to see the Ting Tings we would be standing on the bottom of the wrong side of the hill, looking at people’s feet. There were no screens, and we would have been lucky to hear the occasion sound. I was extremely disappointed as it had taken me a fair while to warm to their music, but had gotten to the point where they were one of my “must see” acts for the day. Lesson learned, I made it a priority to make sure I was at the appropriate stage in time for the band. We decided we’d tackle the bar situation.

We got to the bar to find you had to buy drink tickets, which you could then redeem at the bar for the respective drinks. I lined up, saw there were some cocktails available so bought enough tickets to buy several (not all at once though). I made my way into the drinks shed, which was actually just a regular tin shed with a massive bar running down the length of the room. Lines were formed all way down, so I joined a line and waited. It was so incredibly hot in that shed, that you could see people with sweat running down their faces and dripping off their noses. I started to crave some water, rather than a cocktail. By the time I got to the front of the line I’d decided I was going to use up all my tickets to buy one cocktail and one water, and just go back for more tickets. But when I asked the lady, I was informed they didn’t sell the cocktails there. I asked for just a regular vodka cruiser then, and was told the vodka tent was outside. Frustrated, and not wanting to go away empty handed after waiting in the sweat box I asked simply for a bottle of water. She gave it to me, then told me that even though I’d only requested water, the fact that I’d entered the bar meant she had to check my ID. Um, riiiight. I handed over my ID, she opened my water bottle, then I bailed.

I left the bar area, and bitched to Jo about the experience. She pointed out the vodka stand where she’d gotten her cruiser, but by then I didn’t want to line up again to get into the bar grounds (it was fenced off outside so you had to show ID to get in there first, before making your way to the tin shed or vodka stand) so we left. We made our way back to the main stage, where we found some seats up the back in the grand stand, and had a rest.

2.30pm – For the next 2 hours we sat on the grand stand and has some food and drinks, and generally relaxed. From our seats we had a decent view of both the orange and blue stages at one time. While we weren’t exactly close, we could still see the bands perform and look at the screens beside the stage. The music was loud and we were able to enjoy it. We caught the end of Cog, who I really don’t mind. I’ll have to research more into them and listen to their album. From the looks of things they were putting a lot of effort into their performance, and it sounded pretty good!

Next up was Bullet for my Valentine, and boy, what an experience! I hope this is the correct genre, but it sounded like death metal? Whatever it was, it was a lot heavier than the music I am used to. I can’t say I was sitting in my seat dancing along, but I can’t say I didn’t enjoy their performance either. They put in a lot of energy, and definitely got the crowd pumped up. At one point they took a break, where the lead singer asked the girls to flash him. He then proposed they attempt to break the world record for the “most flashed boobs at one time in one place” (which I tried googling but the most I could find was this video…most shocking anyway). It was obvious the singer just wanted to see lots of boob action, but the guys behind me were quite vocal in voicing their opinion the only reason he wanted to see boob was to try and convince others that he wasn’t gay. Either way, he got what he was after a bazillions of girls in the mosh pit flashed him.

Bullet for my Valentine performing at Big Day Out

At another point in the performance he explained to the crowd what a circle pit was. For those who don’t know, a circle pit consists of everyone running madly in a circle. That’s it. If you fall over you’re doomed, cause no one’s going to stop and help you. For an example of a circle pit, check out the video of one at the DevilDriver concert. It took a while for the Gold Coast people to get it together, one guy started running against the crowd and the lead singer of BFMV pretty much took the piss out of him over the mic. Eventually they got it started, and got a decent sized circle. I tried taking a photo, but it was pretty pointless given it just looked like tons of people standing around.

3.40pm - finally it was time for my next must see band to come out – Sneaky Sound System. I had seen them before at Live Earth in Sydney, and was eager to see them again. I’ve got their second album, aptly titled “2″, but it’s been a bit of a grower. I didn’t immediately take to it like I did their first, so I was hoping that a live performance would aid in making me appreciate the album more. They lived up the expectation. They chatted with the crowd, performed all their best songs, and really enjoyed it. Miss Connie was giggling at everyone hitting the big blue beach balls, and trying to convince someone to pop one (which they did). I danced and bopped along in my chair, relishing the time spent off my bad knee.

Angus from Sneaky Sound System chatting with the crowd

4.15pm – All afternoon I had been trying to message Paige & Shrek to find out where they were so we could catch up. Unfortunately, the massive clog of the phone lines meant that sending a text was near impossible. And if you did get it through, it took almost half an hour to reach it’s destination (as tested by Jo and I). in fact, one text that I sent her at 6.30pm she didn’t get until 11.00pm that night!! Crazy! I’d managed to phone through to Shrek at one point, but we couldn’t hear each other and ended up hanging up.

Sitting in our chairs, we got a fantastic view of the people wandering past. We got to see tons of crazy costumes and get ups, including a dude with a copious amount of chest hair and the superman symbol carved into it (unfortunately didn’t have time to get a pic), some chicks wearing extremely revealing super hero outfits, a “where’s wally” crew, men in pyjamas etc. And then, there was this guy.

He kept us entertained for so long. No idea on whether he was tripping out on anything, or just naturally enjoyed dancing. But I thought he was pretty damn good! A lot of people walking by just stopped and started dancing with him, and he had a lot of photos taken. He became quite popular!

5.00pm – Pendulum were the next band to come on, and I watched them for a little bit before I decided it was time for a loo visit. Jo and I had decided we were going to go for a walk, and it appeared the line up for the toilets in the pavilion was a lot easier than going to any of the port-a-loos around, and a helluva lot more hygenic. So the decision was I would go to the loo while Jo looked after all the stuff in the stands, then we’d go for a walk.

I headed upstairs and joined the line. And waited, and waited, and waited. While I was waiting, I watched the Pendulum concert on the screens they had in the area. It was like an open bar, so they had one massive screen on a wall, and several others around the place. During Pendulum’s performance, a massive circle opened up towards the back of the crowd. There, guys were wrestling each other, and generally being males. A few scary moments (like when people were flipped mid air while getting tackled) caused the whole room to yell “oh!”, and other times we laughed. Definitely helped  pass the time.

At this stage I decided I would attempt to connect to twitter and write an update on the day’s events. After about 5mins I finally got a connection and was able to put in an update. It then took another 2 – 3 submit attempts before it got through. I was too impatient to try another one, and decided it would just have to wait for when I got home (via this blog entry).

Eventually I got to the front of the line, and made friends with the people around me. We chatted and shared stories, like the time a girls friend was randomly stabbed with heroin at a previous BDO, and didn’t realise until she was in the hospital later thinking she was having a heart attack. We realised the “Girls Only” toilet was in fact a male bathroom (there was another toilet for guys and girls together), which led to tons of squatting jokes. Until someone told us that a few girls actually did squat while the bathroom was full of other waiting people. That would have been pretty gross.

5.45pm – Finally it was my turn, and I promised to be fast. We’d all agreed to do the major power piss, and I’m happy to report I didn’t let anyone down. Too much information of course, but I was damn proud. I was cheered on by my co-urinators, washed my hands and left. A long set of stairs later (it’s still pretty painful going down stairs with my knee) I had rejoined Jo; we picked up our stuff and started on our walk. However, it was not to be – we FINALLY caught up with Paige and Shrek(real name Lee).

Paige, Shrek (Lee) and I (starting to get a sunburnt nose)

We chatted about everything we’d seen in the day. They informed me they’d seen Buzz Lightyear getting around (we’d seen the power rangers), and when they’d seen Sparkadia earlier there’d been barely anyone around. Jo and I decided to hang around to see Serj Tankian (who has a cool website btw) based on Shrek’s recommendation. And I wasn’t disappointed. I didn’t realise Serj was the lead singer of System of a Down, and I really enjoy some of their music too. At this point Jo wandered off to meet up with her mates, and we decided we’d meet back up at 6.30pm.

6.30pm – The Living End had just started, and given I’d never seen them before in concert I was pretty excited. They sounded fantastic! I raced off down towards the massive screen only to realise Jo and I had arranged to meet somewhere else, incidentally exactly behind where I was standing with Shrek and Paige. As I walked along I was singing along to Living End, and thankfully didn’t get any weird looks. Everyone else was singing along too! I arrived at the meeting place to find Jo wasn’t there, so went and stood with Paige and Shrek again. 2 mins later Jo joined us, and we all stood there dancing and singing along to the Living End.

Around this time I was approached by a drunk guy who wanted to buy my Sombrero (as seen on Shrek’s head in the previous pic). Giggling, I agreed to sell it to him for the random price of $5 (we’d bought them the day before for $10, but selling it meant less hassle carrying it around and having to take it home). He looked in his wallet, and asked if I would accept drink stamps instead. I accepted the offer, but he located $6 in his wallet and gave that to me instead. Bonus! We got a photo of him, before he continued along his merry drunken ways.

Wearing his newly purchased hat

Jo then arrived back from the bar with some drinks for us. They’d run out of standard Vodka drinks, so instead she had a Vodka Cruiser Dry. YUK!! I had a sip and it tasted like a cross between beer and vodka. I think I managed about half the can before palming it back off to Jo. I wasn’t a fan.

7.45pm – The Arctic Monkeys were now playing, and it was finally dark in the showgrounds. It’s fantastic just how many new bands the Big Day Out has revealed to me, this was one of them. Their music had been on high rotation at home for the last week or two, so I was able to join in for a sing along at a few points. We were standing really far back from the stage, and there was no hope of getting any photos at this point of the night. Instead, I just kicked back and enjoyed the music.

After a little bit I decided I was going to finally go and get the Vodka Slurpee I’d been hankering for all day. We’d asked at the ticket booth back at the top of the pavilion earlier in the day and were advised we didn’t need tickets for the slurpees, so I headed straight for the bar. After lining up for 10mins, I neared the front of the line and saw the sign $10, so figured the ticket lady was right. The person in front of me handed over their tickets for a drink though, so I started to worry again. I asked, and sure enough you needed tickets. I left the line and wandered around looking for the ticket booth to be near the bar, but couldn’t find one. Annoyed, I walked back to my friends and refused to go to the ticket booth at the top of the pavilion to buy more tickets. That meant lots of climbing and descending stairs, and at the time of the day I was getting a bit tired. No slurpee for me.

9.00pm – After watching half an hour of Neil Young, we weighed up what our options were for the evening. Based on our experience with the Ting Tings earlier in the day we were really wary of attempting to see The Prodigy. I really wanted to see them (I’d heard they’re absolutely amazing live), but with two people unable to handle the crowds due to existing injuries, and probably a lot more people staying to see the Prodigy than the Ting Tings, we decided to give up on that idea. Reluctantly, we left the showgrounds and headed for the free bus back to Surfers Paradise.

Jo and I bid Paige and Shrek goodbye (they were headed in the opposite direction back to the car park) then headed for the stairs. Picking up some ice creams, and stepping over the passed out guy at the bottom of the stairs, we made our way out the front. Back through the shipping containers, we then followed the directions of the staff to the buses. Two guys also making their way home approached a female security officer, then loudly declared they wished to thank her on behalf of everyone at the festival. They both then dropped their pants, to reveal their Borat mankini to the unfazed officer.

Thank you for your services today - verrryy niiice!

Sinking onto the bus, and grateful to be off our weary feet, we took off in pursuit of dinner, then home.

10.30pm – Somehow in the last few hours we’d managed to walk Cavill Ave and pick up some dinner (albeit more fatty crap in the form of Hungry Jacks), and watch an Elvis Impersonator entertain the little kids. I’ll give it to him, he was pretty entertaining and handled the kids really well. Jo is obsessed with him, she’s seen him a few times before and had a photo with him. She thinks he’s the hottest Elvis ever (I quote from Jo’s mouth: “The original Elvis was NOT hot!” *I managed to refrain from trying to slap some sense into Jo*), and to mark the occasion spent several minutes taking photos of him, including his butt when his back was turned.

We walked home and ate our dinner on the balcony, feet up on chairs feeling sorry for ourselves. Jo and I had pretty extensive sunburns on our upper body, so I applied some moisturiser to try and get in early before the sting came, but it would later prove to be futile. As I ate my food I rang Mat, and Jo used the opportunity to take a photo of us looking like absolutely buggered red lobsters.

More sunscreen during the day required for the both of us!

We stayed up for a bit and watched some TV while our food digested, then straight to bed. It had been an absolutely massive weekend, but one that I would not regret in the least. I learnt some lessons, namely:

• Planning for every possible outcome at the Big Day Out sucks. Don’t take a bag packed full of stuff, it’s shit having to carry it around everywhere. Who cares about ponchos. If it rains on the day relish it. Dance in the rain to the music, enjoy the spontaneity of the occasion.
• Sunscreen is your friend. If you have skin like mine, SPF30+ every 2 hours is not going to cut it. Apply once an hour, make it a ritual to do it as each band finishes.
• Spend the money and buy a f’load of drink tickets first up in the day. Saves you having to do two stops just to get a drink.
• Arrange a meeting spot and time with friends before the day. Phone lines will be jammed, and text messages take forever to be sent/received. And at the end of the day you don’t want to be looking at your phone all day on the off chance someone’s messaged you.
• Prepare to be absolutely buggered. I should have taken Monday off work instead of being a zombie.

Based on all the above, I sure as hell can’t wait for next year. I won’t be injured (I hope), I won’t be carrying a heavy pack, and I’ll be ready to drink and sing along (and dance if I’m drunk enough). I had to pop my “big day out virginity” sometime, and props to Jo for making me come. Bring on BDO 2010!!

**More photos can be viewed on my facebook album here**

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