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article 0062 added 12.02.03 words
Kobi
If there is one thing that drives me well and truly round the bend it is waiting. I've waited for various things on four of the world's seven continents and trust me the queues in say, Saudi Arabia's Jeddah airport and Thorpe Park in Surrey are no more glamorous than the queues at the central post office in Ghana. And yet again I find myself waiting. This time it's for a coach from Nottingham that will all but be our home for the next three days. Having changed my last £40 into euros and been suitably shocked by the John Leslie revelations splashed across the front pages of the tabloids and remembering that I had left a newly bought eighth of Reading bud in my record box at home it was nigh on time to start chewing the walls. Just as I was wondering what the ferry terminal's flaking enamel finish would taste like with a nice chianti our carriage arrived. Mick (The b-boy formerly known as Blue Eyes) came in to fetch us and we boarded the aptly named 'Skills' bus (The first choice company for schools organizing trips to Alton Towers and b-boy pilgrimages). Upon boarding, we were greeted by a bus half full of breakers and graf artists from around the Europe (Hungary and Northern Ireland representing!) as well as Wolverhampton graf legend Temper, original Notts trooper Joe Buddah, and freestyle legend Supernatural.
After yet more waiting the coach wallowed into the ferry's car hold, and we raced off it to find a bar. Stella Artois (x3) and non-descript alcopop (x2) went a long way to improving my mood and the crossing seemed to take no time at all. While Ady (Indelible's cameraman) headed out onto the deck to get some shots of the rapidly disappearing White Cliffs, myself and D got chatting to this cat Ed, a promoter from Notts way. Fearing a full body cavity search from draconian French customs officers he had also left an eighth of prime cannabis at home. We made a solemn pact to split any form of smokeable (no rocks, please) that we could lay our hands on once we arrived in our first port of call. To truly compound our frustration a sullen looking customs official waved straight through the coach. I could have been a hip-hop Hunter S. Thompson, and packed a hold-all full of choice buds instead of clothes and swanned through the system without a care in the world. Fortune, what a cruel mistress you are. Back on the bus various b-boy videos kept us entertained as we drove across the top of France and into Belgium.
Darkness fell with next to no warning and the drone of the coach engine sent me to sleep. After a shallow nap I woke to see the bus picking its way through the cobbled streets of Ghent, missing cars parked on either side of the road by a matter of inches. Almost immediately, the Englishness of the party shone through. Getting off the bus to ask directions, Mick's limited (read: non-existent) knowledge of the native language shone through, and traveling on a hunch and some frenzied left/right/straight ahead hand movements we eventually reached our destination. Still drowsy and warm in the parka jacket I had been using as my blanket I got off the bus and started looking for my bag, only to be informed that we were not at the hotel but at a club…Still half asleep I started to run through the Indelible publicity drill for places we had never visited before (Chapter 2 in 'Guerilla Marketing' by Kobi M. Annobil) and stickered any and every surface in sight. Still not sure of what was going on I followed the rest of the assembled party to a small doorway, where posters bearing the names of fellow passengers Supernat and Joe Buddha (known to everyone on the bus as Dougie) advertised that they would be headlining tonight. Upon following the narrow staircase upwards I was greeted with a sight that I will never forget. The claustrophobic atmosphere opened up into a high ceilinged hip-hop heaven. Belgian b-boys and b-girls were busting moves as the Ultramagnetic MC's 'Chorus Line' and Kurious' 'Spell it with a J' echoed off the walls. Belgian DMC champion DJ Grazzhoppa span the classics as my fellow travelers began securing various pads, and head garments before doing Blighty proud. After distributing Indelible flyers to the spectators, myself and Ed set about securing some smoke. A group of Belgian kids were exceptionally gracious to me - bearing in mind that I was wild-eyed and acting slightly unpredictable due to disrupted sleep and low THC levels - and crashed me a reefer, which I split with my fellow scavenger. After I was suitably calm I settled in to watch Supernat and Joe rock. Now, myself and my DJ, Merkin had been scheduled to make up a support act for Supernatural in Grimsby a couple of years ago but an argument between a drunken Hull local and my man's Volvo had put paid to that. All that aside the boys destroyed it, with Supernat's spot-on freestyles and Joe's use of some of the heaviest instrumentals on the market today. Neither of them had ever been to Ghent before but after a show like that I don't thnk the heads in the Belgian town will forget them in a hurry.
After hooking up with a member of the Zulu Nation (Belgian Chapter, yo!) to do a shout for Indelible (through an interpreter) we had a brief wait. I was scheming on the open mic that was scheduled to go off in the basement of the club, but alas it was not to be. Everyone piled back onto the coach and we rolled towards Brussels. Still quite twisted from the charity I had received earlier, sleep was imminent and after another fitful bout of shut-eye I woke to hear Tommy, a semi-retired b-boy and one of the older heads on the bus - regaling everyone with his tales of how Goldie and other former b-boys turned celebrities "used to come round my yard for beans and toast, yahgetme?" Shortly after 2 a.m. I sloped off the bus and loaded myself up with bags of camera equipment. After sorting out the keys I found myself in possibly the plushest hotel room I have ever seen. After a brief walk in the biting cold we found a suitably greasy take-away to fill our faces in. After buying some Chocomel (The Stoner's Holy Grail - anyone who has ever been to Amsterdam will tell you how important this liquid is to modern life), and admiring the giant vending machines (the size of a shop front, and a godsend if you ever feel the need to buy nappies and Kit-Kats at 3 o'clock in the morning) myself, Ed and D returned to the room to split some hash that he had been given by a sympathetic Ghentian. After a well earned smoke in front of the news (Russians taken hostage in an opera house), I finally crept under the efficient hotel duvet and passed out.
- Kobi
