Story of a Wimbledon Queuer
A lot of people have asked me about my experience queuing at Wimbledon so I thought I’d make a blog post about it. This isn’t my study abroad blog and I haven’t used this tumblr in ages, so don’t expect much more out of me.
My friend Meredith and I were in London during a weekend trip organized by our study abroad program in Spain. We opted to stay an extra day so that we could go see the finals. London was incredibly Wimbledon-centric this weekend, selling all sorts of strawberry delights in honor of the event. On Saturday night, we left at about 11pm to go meet my friend Kuren at his place. That was an adventure on its own since without the use of wifi, I had no way of contacting him once we got slightly lost. Luckily we ran into people who happened to live in the same apartments as him. We then left his place around 12:45am and then had to run about 5 blocks to the train station so we could catch the one heading out to Wimbledon.
Once we arrived at Wimbledon Station, we were greeted by large amounts of decoration for the event. However, since we got there at about 1:30, the bus to the queue wasn’t running, so we decided to make the trek up there. We passed through Wimbledon village and quickly faced an uphill battle for a good 15 minutes. And then it began to rain. None of us had umbrellas, so we dredged through with a slightly cranky mood. What felt like ages later, we arrived at the queue in position #319-322. Meredith and I grabbed sheets and pillows from the hostel we were staying at and we used that to spread out on the ground. The four of us huddled together but that didn’t do much to protect us from the rain and wind. It was a pretty miserable night. None of us slept much, if at all. Morale was at an all time low here.
Around 6:30, officials told us to pack up our “tents” and condense more. At 7:30, we moved onto the Wimbledon golf course, where we sat for another good three hours. We bought umbrellas here though, so we were protected even if it wasn’t raining anymore. Finally, at 10:30, grounds opened and we made our way through security where I lost my water bottle, Kuren lost his wine bottle opener, and Meredith lost her college flag that she took around all of Europe. We paid £8 to get in and then quickly made our way to Henman Hill and spread out. After that, we just grabbed lunch and souvenirs, then slept till about 1:30pm. The match started at 2pm and Henman Hill was packed with an official yelling at us to condense and not to be “selfish.”
The match was epic. Henman Hill was, no exaggeration, 90% Federer fans, so we were right at home. But even when Djokovic won, everyone stood up and clapped. People ask me if I’m upset by the result, and while I’m sad Federer lost, Djokovic is my second favorite and I’m so happy for him. I knew going into this that I would be happy regardless and the experience made it unforgettable. Kuren calls it the culmination of my journey, which I couldn’t agree with more. I’ve been watching tennis for about 13 years now and have been a little morose the past two days at the thought that I’ll most likely never experience something like that again (because hopefully if I make it back, I’ll actually get a seat in the stadium). But that’s also what makes it such a special moment.
Oh, and on the way back through Wimbledon Village, I bought some Sugarpovas. Stay posted for my thoughts on those.
romaincrisis
snowghoul
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