Fifa Fanfest Darling Harbour

The FIFA FanFest at Darling Harbour was incredibly well organised...and probably still is being run well because it continues until July 12th. What a great bonus for Sydney football/  soccer fans. When I realised it was on when I was there I was thinking it would be a real wet blanket over everything . Totally the opposite. It lent a good flavour and atmosphere to Darling Harbour and to be able to see that amount of technology and that amount of people organisation run so smoothly was really interesting . It was impressive. I was impressed with the way it ran, how they organised the fan area but still let shoppers and strollers shop and stroll. They even cleared a lot of it out of the way so the Stitches and Craft Fair ladies had an unhampered entrance to the Sydney Convention Centre. Such a lot of thought and planning must have gone into this and so many people must have had some good trouble shooting and thinking on their feet skills. There was some great art work, the great big screen, other entertainment.It really was a festival atmosphere and the football/ soccer fans had a good place to be to celebrate and enjoy the sport they love so much. People from all nations were well represented and were feeling really good about this. The night Australia went down to Germany was the only sour note. The hoo-ha, yahooing and nasty noise which went on all night was ridiculous and the mess they left the next day was not repeated either before or after, so it was the only night where disrespect for everyone and everything was shown.

All the other things were genuinely cheerful events which pulled huge crowds. It distracted from none of the other activities at Darling Harbour but because the sound system was so good and the management so careful then it was something people enjoyed whether they were a fan or not. That to me is the secret of any big event. If you can make people feel like they belong whether they have an interest in the event  or not, then you have won them over and they don't mind everyone has a turn at their major racket and the FanFest was noisy...but good noisy! I hope they are all still enjoying it! I actually miss the sound of the crowd cheering for the goals and then the mass groans when something went wrong...but they played some really cool music and I miss that too. Sydney fans are so lucky!