defying gravity.

As I said when I first arrived, Wicked the Broadway Musical is playing in downtown Auckland. I’ve had some of my favorite evenings ever at Wicked (every time with Carlee Macon Buchanan who has changed me for the good). It’s been showing here for two months now, and if I hadn’t paid that $400 beef jerky fine, I would’ve committed some money to it right away.

Brittany had never seen the brilliant show, so we kept looking on gumtree and trademe to find more affordable tickets. While Brittany was searching, she found information on entering a free lottery to win front row tickets (well, they still cost $35). We just had to show up two and a half hours before the show. If your name gets drawn, you can purchase two front row tickets that would have been $120 each.

So as we were leaving Northland and heading south, we thought we’d try our luck. I felt hopeful until Brittany read that the show had sold out. Then the odds of all three of us getting in were extremely low, but the event centre was right next to Starbucks, so we had nothing to lose (except $5.70 for a gingerbread latte). Brittany pointed out that if someone was filling out their ballot and only indicating that they needed one ticket, we could try to stop them and see if they’d mark “two tickets” and then pay them a little extra.  

This was a great point, but execution was hilarious. I went up to random people filling out their ballots and said, “Are you alone? Are you in need of just one ticket? Do you want to see the show with me?” People looked at me like I was crazy. There was a lot of laughter. Brittany said we’re like Pinky and the Brain, she comes up with crazy ideas, and I make a fool of myself.

In the thirty minutes that we were in the ticket office before the drawing, we saw at least fifty people signing up. Our hopes were dwindling rapidly, but I was still excited about being in a town big enough to have a Starbucks.

We were told they would draw six names. The woman went over to the bin and picked out the first ticket. Our hearts were beating rapidly…

She opened it up and said, “Brittany Mar..ii…umm?”

We looked at each other in complete disbelief. Then we clapped. After the other five names were drawn, the ticket office manager said, “We have a few other discounted tickets available, see me here if you are interested.”

I used my short little legs and shimmied up to her and she said, “You’ll be on the front row also if that’s OK. $45, please.”

So there we were, three poor travelers on the front row to see the most beautiful show. I was close enough to make awkward eye contact with a flying monkey. And we could tell Glinda was wearing a wig. The orchestra director’s hands were the only thing in front of us. It was unreal and so beautiful and I will never forget it. It felt like we defied gravity.