The Amazing Race - U2 Edition

Sunday Night, 10pm
Current location: Beirut, Lebanon
The Clue: get to a U2 concert 24 hours from now, then be back to work in Sofia, Bulgaria on Tuesday morning. Use every form of transport possible. The team that does not get to work on Tuesday morning might get fired. Bonus points for seeing the opening band.

Only flight from Beirut to Istanbul (that we could afford): Monday at 7 AM.

With no more than 4 hours of sleep per night since we left for our trip to Beirut (see these two posts from Jeff for all the details of our stay in Beirut: here and here), Jeff and I bade goodbye to Beirut and our friends Andris and Prairie to catch a 5 AM cab to the Beirut airport on Monday morning.  We had about 2.5 hours of sleep this night.  The streets of Beirut were very sleepy on a Monday morning.  So were we.  The flight from Beirut to Istanbul was uneventful.  I read.  Jeff managed to sleep a little bit. TRANSPORT: plane.

We arrived at Sabiha Gokcen International Airport on the Asian side of Istanbul at around 9 AM.  This was about an hour away from the European part of Istanbul and where we had a hotel.  Although Jeff had some information on transit options from this airport, we still had a hard time finding the right bus as few of them were labeled.  Luckily, Jeff is much more outgoing than I am, so he asked a couple of different people and got us on the right bus.  After about 50 minutes we were let off at the bus and ferry station. TRANSPORT: bus.


Having had no breakfast yet (except a small snack on the plane), we were immediately drawn to the pretzel stand and then to the doner stand.  With our bellies temporarily full, we headed into the madness of a bus and ferry station on a Monday morning.  We went to several wrong ticket booths: one for the buses, one for a tour ferry, a confusing electronic ticket dispenser, and finally found a person to sell us the tokens to get on the ferry across the Bosphorus to European Istanbul. A mere 1.5 Turkish Lira each (about $1).  Seated on an upper deck outside, we enjoyed watching as our ferry dodged the innumerable cargo boats headed to and from the Golden Horn of Istanbul.  Not a bad price for a cruise from Asia to Europe. TRANSPORT: ferry.


Off the boat into a tram for another 1.5 Turkish Lira each and we were off to Sultanahmet, the touristy area of Istanbul that we both have been to before (Jeff 2 more times than me with friends and family).  We got off the tram near the Hagia Sofia and Blue Mosque and walked the rest of the way to our hotel hoping fervently that our room was ready (it was only about noon) so we could take a nap before working on actually getting our tickets to the night's show.  Hallelujah!  The room was available.  And quite nice!  A lovely place called the Tashkonak Hotel.  Next it was time for a 3-hour nap. TRANSPORT: tram/train, by foot.


Luckily we set an alarm because we were both so exhausted that we passed out completely in our comfy bed at Tashkonak.  Our next task was to figure out where to get our tickets. We had already purchased them online, but we'd gotten mixed messages about where we should actually pick them up: the first message said we HAD to get them at the stadium, and the second email said that we could NOT get them at the stadium, but instead had to get them at a Biletix outlet near Taksim Square.  Considering that Ataturk Olympic Stadium was generally agreed to be in the middle of nowhere, and our most recent email said go to the Ticketmaster-owned Biletix, we decided to try that first.  We walked again to the tram, rode it to the end of the line, and hopped on the nearest (OK, the only) funicular to get to Taksim Square (we love funiculars!).  Arriving at insanely-busy Taksim Square we navigated our way out by following the trolley rails to the bookstore that had the Biletix outlet.  And a line coming out the door.  It was 5:15 PM. Opening band Snow Patrol was supposed to go on stage at 7:30 PM.  We did not expect to wait in line here. TRANSPORT: tram/train, by foot, funicular.


I grabbed a spot in the line while Jeff went and asked a bunch of people if this was the right line.  Or at least tried.  Many people did not speak English, but he was lucky enough to find a group who spoke English that told him they had been in the line for 1.5 hours already!  And they weren't even in the door to the bookstore yet!  Was the line even moving? This is when we started worrying.  Were we going to miss U2?!  After all we did to make this happen?!  I tried to be optimistic and assumed the people he talked to were just exaggerating.  An hour later Jeff went to get us some food.  He asked more people and everyone seemed to think we were in the right place.  We wondered if we should just get to the stadium and hope our tickets were there, but we decided that since we were already in line and had waited an hour we might as well see it through.  Plus the stadium was really far away and we'd really be in trouble if we got there and needed to get our tickets from here. Meanwhile we were trying to figure out how to actually get to the stadium which by some accounts was 2 hours away.  After waiting in line for 2.5 miserable hours, we handed over our reservation number only to have the nice man (only one guy running this show) tell us he couldn't help us.  We had to go to the stadium.

Both of us almost burst into tears right there.  I stormed out and Jeff followed me wondering if I was going to go postal.  I was seething!  How did it take so damn long for the line to move?! It's a pretty simple process: I want/have a reservation for a ticket.  Here's my money/reservation confirmation.  Print ticket.  Bye bye, have fun at the show!  Seriously!  How was that line so impossibly slow?!  And why were we stupid enough to stay in it all that time?  It was 7:30 PM.  Snow Patrol was on.  Damn. U2 was on in an hour and a half.  Double-damn. Could we get to the stadium in time to see this band that I've been dreaming of seeing for over 20 years?!  TRANSPORT: none.


I wanted to cry, but I also knew that that wasn't going to help us get to the show.  So we speed-walked back to the Square in hopes of getting a taxi.  But no one spoke English and no one had any idea where we wanted to go.  U2? Really? You haven't heard of the biggest band to ever play a concert in Istanbul? There are posters all over town. Whatever. The subway then.  So down, down, down into the bowels of Istanbul.  Two stops down the line, then up, up, up to find a bus to Yenibosna where we might be able to find another bus for the concert or maybe could grab a taxi.  As we were searching for the right bus, we found a couple of Turkish guys that were also heading to the concert, so we asked if we could latch on to them to make sure we didn't get lost (they admitted to not knowing how to get there either, but at least they spoke Turkish!).  The bus slowly got so packed that we couldn't move but we suffered from the smell of humanity for 14 stops to get to Yenibosna.  Off the bus we asked our new Turkish "friends" if we could share a taxi with them.  And let me tell you, I wish I'd gotten this taxi driver's card, because if I ever need to get anywhere in Istanbul, this guy will get me there.  I've never been in a car that had such an aggressive driver.  He kept calling someone who was paying attention to the traffic for the concert, so we new there was a nasty traffic jam at the stadium.  But that didn't faze this guy.  In and out of traffic.  Driving down the shoulder.  Pushing his way past vehicles 10 times his size.  More in and out of traffic.  Driving off an exit then back on an on-ramp, just to pass a few cars. Suddenly he decided to go the other direction, then into some side streets. Not really side streets, actually, but a small village. Where was this village in the greater metropolitan Istanbul area? Who knows?  Jeff and I had no idea where we were.  I guess that was good because I would have started freaking out if I knew he was going AWAY from the stadium.  But somehow he wound his way through some neighborhoods and business parks and finally, there it was.  The stadium in all its glory.  And hardly anyone there!  It was after 9 PM and it looked like absolutely nothing was happening in the stadium and that it was barely half-full (is this the right place??). And the friendly Turkish guys didn't even let us pay for part of the taxi ride! TRANSPORT: subway, bus, craziest/best taxi ride ever.


But we still didn't have tickets.  This is when we started joking about the amazing race and the title of this post was born.  From one person to the next we kept asking "official" looking people where we were supposed to go to pick up our tickets.  No, not this booth, you have to go to K section.  You should run, they might be closing.  We ran. No, not here.  Try the next gate.  Hmmmm.  I'm not sure.  OK, I'll let you in here.  No, this is not the right place.  ARGH!  Now I know what it's like to want to pull your hair out.  Finally, a nice young man actually walked with us to the correct booth - he even said that no one there really knew what was going on.  Truly the organization of this show was pretty dismal.  So, at about 9:45 PM we FINALLY had our tickets in hand.  Just had to walk half-way around the stadium to get to our seats.  And U2 wasn't playing yet, so we didn't miss any of their show.  Too bad about Snow Patrol - no bonus points for us.  I wanted to see them and this was their last show on the U2 tour.  Such is life or "такъв е жхвотът" in Bulgarian.  TRANSPORT: by foot - walking and running.


You have to see this stadium to believe it.  It looks like either it's still under construction or that it's been left to rot.  It looks like it could be a beautiful place for shows, but it is in pretty bad condition.  I guess it was finished in 2002 in hopes of winning the bid for the 2008 Olympics, but has been rarely used.  It seats almost 80,000 and certainly has the capacity for 100,000 with standing on the floor.  But tonight it was only half-full.  50,000 people showed up to see U2, but it seemed so much smaller than that ("only" 50,000, on their first time ever playing in Turkey, with the cheapest tickets on the whole European tour?!?).  There were barely any people sitting in our section but there were people sitting in our seats.  On any other day I probably would've just sat somewhere else.  Not today.  Today we went through so much to get those tickets, no one but Jeff and I were going to sit in those two seats.  The girl I made move certainly gave me a look like I was an idiot, but how was she to know what a crazy day I had?  We made it.  TRANSPORT: by foot, with beer in hand.


OMG! U2! LIVE!  Need I say more? :)  Almost a week later and I'm still thrilled by it.  In fact, as Jeff and I were discussing who would write the Beirut blog and who would write the U2 blog, he said something along the lines of, "That smile every time U2 is mentioned means you're doing the U2 blog."  I'll put the set list at the end if anyone is interested.  OMG!  It was awesome!  Some of my younger coworkers here who think I'm an old fuddy-duddy since I don't go out that often would not have believed their eyes that I was up til 12:30 AM dancing at a concert.  Fantastic!  Oh so worth all the difficulties of getting there.  TRANSPORT: U2 LIVE! I was in heaven!


Now we had to figure out how to get back to our hotel so we could catch one or two winks before getting on a plane back to Sofia.  After the show we just followed the crowds hoping to find a line of taxis or maybe even some of the buses set up for the event.  We piled onto a minibus that seats about 12 people but by the time we started rolling had at least 30 people in it. I could only hold on to Jeff while we were tossed around as the bus made turns.  It was so tight that no one could possible fall.  We were sardines for 20 minutes.  At least we didn't pay, because the guy collecting money literally could not reach us.  Next we got onto another (bigger, but no less packed) bus towards the main part of the city.  Some locals convinced us the trams would still be running, so get off at such and such stop.  A few other gullible people got off as well and we all discovered that the trams were not, in fact, running at 1 in the morning.  We found a pair of ladies from Slovenia to share a cab with and half an hour or so later we found ourselves a couple of blocks from our hotel.  In bed about 1:45 AM.  TRANSPORT: by foot, minibus, bus, taxi.


An early morning taxi got us to the airport for our flight to Sofia.  Phew.  We made it work on Tuesday with but a few hours of sleep, but still buzzing from the concert.  What a weekend!  I think this past weekend was the closest we have come to anything like the Amazing Race. 


Thanks for reading my brain dump.  Hope you enjoyed it!
-Shannon


U2 360 Tour
Istanbul/Turkey
6 September 2010
Setlist
Return of the Stingray Guitar
Beautiful Day - Always Forever Now
New Year's Day
Get On Your Boots
Magnificent
Mysterious Ways - My Sweet Lord
Elevation
Until The End Of The World
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Pride (In the Name of Love)
In A Little While
Miss Sarajevo
City of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
I'll Go Crazy... (remix) - Discotheque - John I'm Only Dancing
Sunday Bloody Sunday - Get Up Stand Up
Mothers of the Disappeared (Bono was joined on stage by Turkish folk singer, Zulfu Livaneli, to sing this song, and then Zulfu, along with help from the crowd sang his own song: Yigidim Aslanim)
Walk On - You'll Never Walk Alone
One
Amazing Grace - Where the Streets Have No Name
Ultraviolet
With or Without You
Moment of Surrender