Rosa Diaz |
Barcelona(EFE)
More than five months of queues in the case of Taylor Swift in Buenos Aires or five weeks to see Harry Styles in Barcelona are some of the exorbitant waiting times that are handled this season and that lengthen each year.
Putting order in a queue of these dimensions is not an easy task, so each group of ‘fans’ has its rules to avoid conflicts, especially on the day of the concert, when there is always someone who wants to sneak in without having waited the minimum number of hours.
The case of Harry Styles is paradigmatic because his followers are already trained in a form of organization that they used in the days of One Direction.
In the concert that he recently offered in Barcelona, the first to arrive at the door of the Olympic Stadium did so five weeks in advance.
Marta, a passionate follower of the British artist, says that her group showed up as soon as she found out that there were already people queuing up.
Marta’s WhatsApp group is made up of thirty people who have met at previous concerts of the British pop superstar.
When they arrived at the Olympic Stadium, there was another similar gang made up of twenty other ‘fans’, who had settled down with sleeping bags because stadium security and the police did not allow them to set up tents or carry mattresses.
In that austere and self-sacrificing way, Marta has spent six nights in the open, which are few if one takes into account that the wait was 40 days.
Strict rules to keep the turn
The way to make it more bearable is to organize yourself in groups and abide by the rules: the first thing is to reach an agreement with the other groups so that it is clear where each one belongs in the general queue; then you have to organize internally to determine the order of entry into the concert within the group itself, for which an Excel page is usually used where the hours that each person spends in front of the door are noted.
Accounting is complex: the night usually counts twice, you have to accumulate a minimum of hours to stay in the group, sometimes a person who is not in the queue is allowed to cover the shift for another, you can go to the bathroom or buy food and drinks, but you can’t take too long, you are penalized if you sign up in Excel and then you don’t go and many other rules that depend on each group.
In addition, external elements may arise that complicate the issue, as in the case of Harry Styles in Barcelona, in which the fans found another concert, that of Beyoncé, and the head of security at the Olympic Stadium told them that they had to withdraw from the door.
The campers didn’t want to leave because they were afraid they would be taken away, but concert security told them they already knew them and wouldn’t let others in, so they temporarily moved to the sidewalk in front and came back when Beyoncé’s crowd left.
Fights in the networks
Other problems can also arise, such as the nasty name-calling fights and serious threats that sometimes break out on networks between those who are camped out and those who want to be in the front row but can’t get in line.
In the case of the Harry Styles concert, Marta assures that she was scared because she feared that those who insulted them on the networks would go to the Stadium and things would come to blows.
“People we know from other concerts insulted us and they were very aggressive,” he explained, “they even spread the phone number of one of those who were queuing up and began to threaten her directly on her mobile.”
“They criticized us because they said they worked and I couldn’t come,” says a friend of Marta’s, “but it’s not true, I work as a monitor and I’ve been able to do my queue hours, I even have friends who live in Mallorca and Malaga who have come several weekends before the concert to do their hours and have been able to be in the front rows.”
Fortunately, when everyone found themselves in the same queue on the day of the Harry Styles concert in Barcelona, calm remained and no one was aggressive, as some feared.
There weren’t too many people trying to sneak in either, and those who did were intercepted and sent to Barcelona in the end without too many problems, which worked much worse at the same artist’s concert in Madrid a few days later.
time or money
Being in the front row is not an easy task, but the followers who achieve it assure that it is worth it; “It’s the only way to see it properly because if you’re a little behind, people cover you when they pick up their phones,” says a “fan” of Styles.
“In the front row it’s good because it’s less overwhelming, those who are further back are very tight and there are many people who faint,” he adds.
There is another way to get to the first rows – buy a much more expensive ticket in the VIP area. A system of being the first that does not require time, but money, and that is also on the rise.