Red Bull Cliff Diving returned to Boston this past
weekend. My friends and I attended the
first Boston event two years ago but missed it last year, so we really wanted
to return this year and get back into it.
Imagine our surprise and disappointment upon discovering
that free tickets were needed to enter any of the three reserved viewing
areas.
At first I was irritated about this restriction. It's a free event. It's a public event. Boats all over the water will be able to
watch the event. It's smack in the midst
of Harbor Walk. Seriously. What the hell already.
It wasn't until one of my friends told me why tickets,
regardless of the fact that they were free, would be required and why the
crowds would have to be controlled: Tsarnaev.
Those two asshole foreign radical zealot extremist fuckers. The Boston Marathon Bombers.
It turns out the security was sufficient to allow general
public admission to controlled areas, but there was an awful lot of "move
along" areas, and we ultimately could only see a few yards of the free
falls of each diver. Red Bull had
smartly set up a Jumbotron, though, and by the fifth diver we had it down to a
science: Watch the giant plasma as the
divers lifted off, count to three as they twisted and contorted, quickly turn
to the left and watch one second of the free fall, then turn back to the
Jumbotron to see the landing, the scores, and the replay.
Even though it prevented us from taking pictures since we
really didn't have an ideal vantage point, we got to see two rounds of dives,
the preliminary required dives and the round of spectacular dives of varying
degrees of difficulty. When we retreated
to the outdoor patio of Atlantic Beer Garden next door, we were thrilled to
discover that we could see the divers walking the platform and taking off into
the air, then we could watch the complete dive on a five-second delay via
closed-circuit television.
The day ended with Michal Navratil, dressed in his Speedo
and wearing a red cape secured around his neck, impersonating Superman flying
through the air. You can Google it if
the link fails to work here. I
"borrowed" it from the Internet:
http://www.empowernetwork.com/justiniskandar/blog/superman-dive-from-27m-high-platform/
I thanked some of the event security staff and some of the
Boston police for being diligent and providing a safe event for all of us even
though their attempts to protect us also prevented us from seeing parts of the
competition. They were all reasonably upbeat. A uniformed duo from the Boston Bomb Squad
even let us approach and per their dog.
There were moments that made us wonder, like when the guy in
front of me in the security check line had a backpack on so I moved to the next
line, as if being four feet away were going to make one iota of difference
should he decide to detonate himself. Or
the guy who planted himself right next to us on the wall in front of the grassy
knoll then proceeded to read a book rather than watch the divers while a black
backpack sat at his feet.
Then there were moments of hilarity like when we were told
by the officers and the posted signs that we were in an area where we must keep
moving, so even when we stopped for a moment due to crowd bottlenecks or to
watch a practice dive, we continued to shimmy and shake. We told the perplexed officers, "We're
still moving!"
Or when we spread our feet out from the grass onto the stone
seating area so no one would sit in front of us but refused to actually sit on
the stone seating area ourselves because the sun had made it hot enough to fry
an ass cheek.
Or when we played Musical Chairs at the Atlantic Beer Garden
with me giving up my coveted seat with the full view of the diving platform
only to discover I had actually scored the primo seat to watch the closed
circuit television broadcast. The
manager started to get nervous because we kept shifting chairs around on the
restaurant patio and were doing so without the proper Musical Chairs musical
accompaniment.
Or when we distracted the bomb-sniffing dog only to have him
jump up to greet my friend because she had the scent of her own dog all over
her clothing. The pooch was so friendly
and adorable that I had to wonder if he defused bombs by charming them into
submission as he had us.
Or when we got into the wrong exit lane at the parking lot
because apparently we cannot read "Charge cards only" and were
distracted by the man on foot trying to pay the parking meter before he had
gone to his car. It was like watching
the scene in Blazing Saddles when
they have to go get a shitload of dimes for the makeshift desert toll.
Or when we were all forced to go use the ladies room
upstairs because the band was blocking the one downstairs, and a young man
walked by while I was waiting for everyone to clear out from the potty line,
and he did the elbow bump ... with me … on purpose … that he initiated.
All in all, it is another fantastic day of misadventures in
Boston, we get to see some incredible dives, we meet some interesting people
while milling about on the lawn, and we get to cut the ridiculously long line
to get into Atlantic Beer Garden because, much to the chagrin and surprise of
the twenty-somethings standing there complaining as we cut the line to a primo
spot on the deck, we have connections.
What we saw today in addition to some fantastic diving is
quite simple: We saw the new era ushered
in with the paranoid overkill of police and security, we saw some great audience
behavior throughout the toasty, sunny afternoon, and we saw what Boston does
that only this city can do best -- We
saw Boston Strong today, and it
almost felt like those old times before April 2013. Almost.
And those little fuckers are not taking that away from us ever.
