Today, I broke a personal record for standing in queue.
-
Despite my own better judgement, I went to the Air Show with Weng, Kimmie and Elny. When the idea to go was first proposed, my mind immediately threw up images of HEAT, CROWDS and QUEUES. However, since Weng and Elny were really excited about it, I decided to go along.
-
We opted to go on a Sunday which was a wise move cos on the first day, people apparently queued for more than 2 hours to board the shuttle bus to get to the exhibition venue from the pick-up point at Pasir Ris MRT Station.
-
When we arrived at Pasir Ris, we found that all the public car parks within a nearby radius of the MRT Station were full and vehicles were being turned away by car park attendants. After 15 minutes of driving around, we found a parking space on the 4th floor of a multi-storey car park about 10 minutes walk away.
-
We initially planned to have a quick breakfast before heading to the exhibition but the sight of the queue for the shuttle buses made us think otherwise.
Besides, Elny had earlier tried to get her daily morning caffeine fix from McDonalds but decided to forgo it rather than join in the ridiculous queue, which seem to be happening everywhere in the vicinity of Pasir Ris MRT Station.
-
The queue for the shuttle bus was crazy. It started at one end of the MRT Station, snaked halfway around it, went in a loop about 200 meters long on the grass patch, then snaked back parallel to the first queue, this time going ROUND THE ENTIRE MRT STATION then snaking out about 100 meters to a field where a zig zag line of at least 15 loops formed (ala Singapore Idol Queue). At the end of the line, we were then ushered down a wooden walkway amid instructions from marshals to "DISPLAY YOUR TICKET TO BE SCANNED! PLEASE HOLD YOUR OWN TICKET FOR FASTER PROCESSING!" (This struck a chord but it didn't occur to me till later.)
I forgot to mention that the tickets were pre-purchased and that there were no tickets sold on-site. Even with such a crowd control precaution, the situation was quite bad but thankfully not chaotic. There were a couple of people who tried to innocently join in the queue by walking alongside and inconspicuously merging themselves into the line. Unfortunately for them, those already in line were not standing for any of that and any queue jumpers were politely but loudly told to join the queue from the end. One lady queueing somewhere in front of us even tried to alert a passing policeman when a guy cut-in right before her and refused to leave. The four of us, including a senior gentleman behind also played our part by ejecting a family of 5 who tried to integrate themselves RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME and acting stupid when I politely told the guy leading them that the queue starts behind.
-
Anyway, after about an hour of queueing, we boarded the bus which took another 30 minutes to reach the Changi Exhibition Centre. Upon getting off the bus, we were herded like sheep into the registration tent where we passed through a metal detector and had our belongings scanned. From there, it was a 10 minute queue to the main arena on the tarmac.
-
We had arrived just 30 minutes before the aerial display started so we quickly grabbed ourselves a cold drink each (2 Bleeding dollars for a can of Coke!) and found ourselves a place to stand on the tarmac. It was a blistering hot day and we only had 2 small umbrellas among us. We also hadn't thought about sunscreen... well Elny was smart enough to at least apply some before she left home.
-
When the show started, cameras of all shapes, sizes and mega pixels rose in unison to the air to catch the flying machines whizzing by. I opted to leave my 7.2mp Cybershot at home in favor of my 3.2mp Camera phone.
-
BIG MISTAKE!
-
Firstly, the sun was so bright that I couldn't even see the display. Secondly, it had not occurred to me that the planes would be flying at a distance away and that my camera phone was not built for zoom shots. So there I was, pointing my phone blindly at the direction of the planes and surprisingly, I managed to track the planes quite well. However, all I got were little dots with wings moving in spectacular formations. I did however manage to get a nice silhouette shot of the Airbus A380 doing a flyby though anyone without detailed knowledge of the silhouette of an A380 would not have known that it was the biggest passenger jet in the world just by looking at the pathetic little thing on my lo-res video clip.
-
The aerial display lasted about an hour and when it ended, we headed to the indoor exhibition area to get out of the midday heat. Unfortunately, that was what most of the god knows how many thousands of people gathered intended to do too and we decided to put off that idea and look at the stationary exhibits on the tarmac instead.
-
There were some military vehicles on display near the performance arena and the crowd was drawn to the only airborne capable vehicle of the lot, the Apache.
Here on the ground, my camera fared better with stationary subjects. However I was starting to feel the effects of the heat (Superman has his Kryptonite... mine is a little more commonly available unfortunately.) and I was more or less walking around like a zombie.
-
I also somehow got separated from my friends and wandered aimlessly into the first air conditioned tent I came across. As expected, it was teaming with people but my steadily rising body temperature forced me into the mass of people within the air-conditioned tent. While walking around it aimlessly, I somehow received a collar pin from someone handing out freebies at the Changi Airport booth before being ushered out with the sea of people back into the searing heat.
I then managed to locate Weng who was fantasizing about buying his own private passenger jet and we then caught sight of the majestic A380 being towed onto the tarmac after its exhibition flight earlier. We took some pictures of the big guy and quickly ducked back into the air-conditioned tent I had just exited before I collapsed of heat stroke.
While in the tent, we received another freebie from the Changi Airport booth... this time a reusable shopping bag which I gave to my mum.
-
Then, we managed to contact Kimmie and Elny, who were at the main exhibition building. We went to meet up with them and were shocked by the freakishly long queue to get out of the exhibition grounds.
-
WE WERE TRAPPED!
-
Since we didn't fancy joining the queue in the hot sun, we decided to look for some food instead. On our way to the food tents, I bumped into Eugene, Veron and their son Zack. Strangely, Eugene was the first person who came to my mind when I thought of an Air Show. I didn't expect to really see him there. Talk about coincidence.
-
After a very brief chat, we continued on our way to the food tents where we had no other option but to pay through our teeth for food. I had a plate of chicken rice ($8) and another can of Coke ($2).
-
cough*ripoff*cough
-
During our (expensive) meal, Elny was excited to show us her prize. While walking through the tent where we got the freebies, she encountered the Black Knights pilots having an autograph session. She was handed one of the Black Knight posters and she took it with glee. However, it turned out that the poster was not signed. It was meant to be given out for the recipient to present it to the pilots for their signatures. What a disappointment.
-
Anyway, 30 minutes later, with our bellies full (and pockets empty), we decided to indulge in Elny's other fancy. We went to join the queue for a chance to walk through a Chinook. We queued for about 20 minutes and was out of the helicopter in less than one. It was surprisingly more empty than I had imagined.
After that, we decided to call it a day and proceeded to join the queue for the shuttle buses, which stretched across the entire exhibition arena.
-
We queued for about 30 minutes before reaching yet another Singapore Idol queue system.
This queue was formed on one side of a canal with the buses on the opposite bank. When you reached the end of the queue, you had to cross a bridge to get to the buses on the opposite side. Just as we were crossing that bridge, it suddenly occurred to me that the way we were herded around the entire day was much akin to that of a scene in some WWI movie. We were like prisoners being herded into a concentration camp for the day. I told my friends about my theory and the lady queueing in front of my started laughing hysterically. She completely agreed with my observation and added that the only difference was that we were all dressed quite nicely.
-
All in all, the queue to get out of the "concentration camp" took about an hour and after a 25 minute bus ride, we were deposited into freedom back at Pasir Ris MRT Station.
-
To celebrate our new found freedom, we decided to have dinner at Xin Wang Hong Kong Cafe at Siglap. I had my favourite Char Siew Rice and a HK Iced Milk Tea. I also ordered a plate of chicken wings to be shared but ended up scoffing the lot cos no one wanted any. We then finished it with a plate of Mango Snow Ice for dessert.
-
To sum it up, the day was not that great. I really enjoyed the company of the friends I was with and the aerial display was a sight to behold. However, the long queues, ginormous crowd, blistering heat (and resulting sunburn) put my experience of the air show deep within the negative. Simply put, I shall not be in a hurry to attend the next one. It just simply isn't worth the hassle, torture and frustrations. I wouldn't have joined the queue in the morning if not for the fact that my friends really wanted to experience the show (and the fact that the tickets were pre-purchased).
-
I don't care how people say that I am being negative about the whole thing but to me, the 3 things I dreaded about the experience was unavoidable throughout the whole time we were there and that's enough to place it in the few really unpleasant experiences I've had in my life.
-
Bleh...
