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Well, well
well...what a ting, Uncle Jack lorse de Mr. Nithe Guy persona an'
had was to be restrained when Andrew Jennings & Co did ketch up wid
him at Piarco. I thought de Leggo Beast was someting he did only use
when playin' on political platforms, but as dey say yuh does live
an'
learn... or so it suppose to be, but I ent so sure dat go ever be de
case wid Trinis after readin' mih breds Peter Blood column Pulse
'bout how de $300 an' $500 tickets was bein' sold outside de stadium
on Wednesday fuh $30 an' $100.
Trinis have to be de most patient an' longanimous people it have in
de whole wide world. Why? Because if after all de commess an'
confufflement we did go through in 1989 (an' again wid de World Cup
ticket allocations) dem scalpers or ticket touts or whatever yuh
want to call dem didn' get hassle, jostle or jes plain get dey tail
cut from every las' fan who had was to sen' text message an wait to
see if dey was lucky enough to be 'allowed' to spend $300 or $500 to
see de most overhyped training session in de history of
football...it cyant be lucky dat dem lucky so.
Yuh know how we Trini like nuttin' better than chance to put on we
red frou-frou an' partylike if we did not only arredy win de World
Cup, but is like is de 6th straight time we do it to...so from de
time dis match wid Peru (ent it was suppose to be Brazil?) start to
get push as de farewell to Latas, yuh know we was waitin' to run
dong tickets like crazy. We did feel it was de same $100 & $200 ting
by KFC, but no ... thsome bright thspark did come up wid de idea to
use dey sponsor (TSTT/bmobile) as de means of allocatin' tickets, an
jackin' up de prices to boot.
OK, now it ent all as bad as it appear...assumin' de text msg ting
was really a random draw by a machine, an even de price ent too bad
if yuh sure de money goin' fuh a good cause. But dey went an'
totally mashup all semblance of de process havin' been thought out
by tellin' people dat is cash only. Apparently bandit not only doh
have cellphone, but if dey have one dey so dotish dat dey cyant read
de msg dat say come to de stadium on saturday and bring $2000 cash
wid yuh... an' unnerstan dat it mean it go have easy pickings. Now I
ent hear 'bout nobody gettin'
rob when dey went fuh dey tickets but de potential fuh disaster was
a lil too close fuh comfort.
But to get back to what Pulse had to say:
National football coach Leo Beenhakker wasn’t the only unhappy
customer on Wednesday when T&T played Peru to a 1-1 draw at the
Hasely Crawford National Stadium. In the post match press
conference, a dour looking Beenhakker expressed dissatisfaction
with the first half performance of his Soca Warriors team, while
scores of fans were overheard grumbling about being cheated after
forking out $300 and $500 for tickets.
Chilling outside the stadium prior to the game, taking in the
colourful scenes, Pulse was dumbfounded to overhear at least one
tout, his hand filled with the specially customized electronic
tickets, loudly hawking $300 tickets for $30, and $500 for $100.
Legit ticket-holders within ear shot, and a couple uniformed
soldiers, approached the man with some concern, one of the soldiers
saying: “But how you could do that man? Allyuh spoiling the thing.
After people spend they money to buy a $500 ticket, how you could
come now and be selling them for $100.”
Perhaps the only happy person after Wednesday’s game was whoever
was responsible for supplying the touts with legit tickets,
creating a deluge of easily accessible cheap tickets. Not many
people were smiling after Wednesday’s game; not Beenhakker,
neither Peru or T&T, and certainly not the touts."
It would appear dat de floodgates HAD was to be opened and tickets
'let loose' because odderwise de stadium woulda be half empty on
Wednesday.
Is a pity Pulse couldn' get to do an 'exit poll' of how many patrons
did pay full price fuh dey tickets. Most probably it woulda be de
exact same number dat did either pay for or did get a ticket from
dey company to attend de $10,000 per table $1000 per person "gala"
at Centre of Excellence.
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