Before The Opening Ceremony

NOTE: Most people around the world would have already seen the Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony so I am not going to post on the event like what they show it on televisions or how you read it in the papers. Instead I will be posting on my personal experience on the big event and all that I write today will be based on my own experience and the photos are of my own taking so don't expect to see Hollywood style presentation and glamorous story telling!

The big day has come! This is the day the world has been waiting for the last 4 years, this is the day when Melbourne will open the 18th Commonwealth Games and I was at work wondering what the crowd and traffic is going to be like out there. The government has been warning people about the traffic congestions and advising people not to drive into the city. I was wondering if I should go home and watch the big opening ceremony on TV or go join the party in the city down by the Yarra River where history is about to begin in just a few hours.

Well let's take it one step at a time and see where we end up. We didn't plan anything so as not to be dissapointed if we don't meet our expectations. The Queen's Baton is making its final journey into Docklands at 4 o'clock so why don't we go and see if we can see anything.

So we did go down to Docklands after work and I was quite lucky to find a carpark. There were lots of people there all to see the baton! The baton was ferried on the replica Endeavor ship to the Docklands from Williamstown across the bay before it was carried by runners on their way to Waterfront City including Anthony Callea the Australian Idol runner-up! Anthony Callea is very popular with the girls and there were screaming girls when he was running down the Esplanade Walk towards Grant Hackett who was the last baton runner for the day. And Grant ran the remainder of the way towards Waterfront City where a crowd is waiting.

Grant Hackett is the captain of the Australian swimming team and at the Waterfront City he gave a short speech with Steve Bracks on the far left. Steve Bracks is the premier of the state of Victoria and the guy in the middle is not important so I won't tell you who he is.

Here the baton will stay on the stage for all to see until about 5 o'clock when it will board a Royal Barge and travel up the Yarra River for the Opening Ceremony. Look at that smooth shinny baton, I wish I could hold it...

...but I'll just settle for a smaller replica of the real thing! Well at least I can camwhore with the replica baton with a cut-out cardboard of Grant Hackett! Hahaha! What a camwhore!

Before 5 o'clock we stayed at Docklands for the concert by different Australian singers. A crowd was building, mostly people are here to see Anthony Callea performing later on.

When he finally got on stage, there was a thunderous roar of screaming SYTs screaming their lungs out for the little guy! Though he came in second place, Anthony does have a very good voice and his music career is actually doing better than the winner of the Australian Idol!


After that we drove down towards the Alexandra Gardens to see how bad the traffic was and I was pleasantly surprised to see that there were not as many cars as I anticipated! The government did a good job at scaring people out of driving into the city! There were still a lot of carparks along the streets leading towards the river and we found a good spot before walking down to the river and were greeted by the people who were already there. I have never seen so many people in one place before! This is truly amazing, would we be able to find a spot down there? I will continue in my next post...

Quick update as I'm writing;
Australia: 2 Gold 2 Silver 3 Bronze
Scotland: 2 Gold
India: 1 Gold
Canada: 2 Silver
England: 1 Silver 1 Bronze