World Cup tickets: The race is on
First in the queue outside Sandton's World Cup ticketing centre was 19-year-old designer Mohammed Dadabhay. He'd been camped out on the street since 1pm on Wednesday afternoon. "I never thought I'd be first," he said, looking rather dazed by the scrum of cameras surrounding him as he waited for the doors to open.
The mood, from first light, was exuberant - bright sunshine and the deafening blare of vuvuzelas - local plastic trumpets - rising over the smart hotels and office blocks of this upmarket suburb of Johannesburg.
For months South Africans have been wrestling with The majority of fans here don't have access to the internet and most people are used to buying football tickets in hard cash if and when they can afford it. Today, at long last, Fifa and local fans seem to be talking the same language. "About time," said one young woman in a bright yellow Bafana Bafana strip.
But when nine o'clock struck, exuberance started to give way to chaos. A small but ugly scrum developed at the door. There were virtually no security guards in evidence. And when Mohammed Dadabhay finally got through, ran up the stairs to the ticketing office and went to the first counter hoping to buy seats at the opening and final matches, things ground to a virtual halt. The computer network was, it seemed, struggling to cope with the abrupt surge of demand. Twenty five minutes later, Mohammed finally came out with proof of payment. But the first self-service printing machine didn't work. Nor did the next. The scrum of journalists followed him around the office until, an hour after he'd come in, he grinned broadly and held up a clutch of yellow tickets.
On the radio we heard reports of similar glitches around the country. No big deal in the long run, I'm sure. Mohammed certainly didn't seem to mind. But in the queue outside, there were some grumbles of frustration as the hours slipped past.
The head of Fifa's local organising committee, Danny Jordaan, was in the Sandton centre, and bristled at repeated suggestions that things weren't going as planned. "I don't think you understand chaos. Unfortunately the system went down. Now it is operating perfectly," he said. "Go and buy a ticket for an FA Cup final at Wembley and see how long it takes."
Foreigners may not be buying tickets as quickly as Fifa had hoped. But the size of the queues and the amount of enthusiasm on display here today suggests that South Africans could easily make up the difference. After years of planning and waiting - and complaints from Fifa that not enough excitement was being generated here - the World Cup has finally become a tangible, thrilling reality for many South Africans. Fifty six days to go....
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