It’s great to be outdoors at a gig

Have to admit that one of the key things I like about New Zealand, thus far, is that loads of folks enjoy being outside. I mean, lots of people.

This last weekend there was Auckland Day (kinda like a birthday for the city) and there were events on around the city (including a Buskers Festival).

On top of that, on Sunday evening there was an open-air concert lasting over 6 hours on Auckland’s harbour front with thousands of people turning up for free music and fireworks:

Local band ‘White Chapel Jak’ accompanied by the Auckland Symphony Orchestra. Brilliant mashup.

What I found fascinating is that loads of artists and presenters on the stage were bigging up NZ as the best country in the world.

No, really, ‘the best’.

OK, I didn’t want to put a downer on this but it’s a bit difficult to disagree with that sentiment when we were all outside watching an open-air gig in the city centre of a beautiful country. It’s easy to see why Kiwis are so proud of their country when large chunks of the rest of the world are in lockdown.

Even more astounding was that, when the concert was over and the lights were switched on, the place wasn’t covered in rubbish. People had taken their rubbish away and/or put it in the bin.

I’ve been to gigs in the UK where, at the end of the night, you’re wading through a sea of trash that folks had just dropped (or thrown). Not here, they put rubbish in the bin. The clean-up crew were having it easy. It was genuinely astounding.

In some ways it made me a bit sad for the UK in that far too many people there are happy to leave mess for others to clean up. And way too many people see that as ‘normal’.

I really hope, for New Zealand’s sake, that it doesn’t get that way here.

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