10 years seems a long time…? Yes, if you look forward to something happening in 10 years… No if you look back at the last 10 years.
So what happened 1997? There was this Irish Band, got to know them very good since 1992’s “Achtung Baby” release, but never seen them before. So there was their new album, “Pop”, and the “Popmart” Tour - my first chance to see them live.
So as internet was not new those days, already been online for some years before, i had to join some infamous Mailing List called “Wire”. Met some people there and found some new friends.
Some Friends that are still friends today, other friends that are still considered friends, but without recent contact nowadays.
1st there was V. from Canada. He was into taping and he is the ‘guilty’ one, pushing me into this concert-taping scene. Didn’t know me, sent me some tapes from his 1st leg popmart recordings and wham - i was on fire… Got all the equipment, ready for the boys to come by my place in August 1997.
But wait. There was another one. Sal. We had some nice conversations about U2 and as he wanted to come to Europe to see some places and visit relatives in Netherlands he just came over.
Well, he jumped onto the plane and actually had no idea if i will be there, waiting on the airport. 10 years ago it was not that usual to fly to the other side of the planet and visit someone you met online. So he took Sul with him. However, there was me, driving to the airport… Delayed flight, stopover in Munich… So i was there waiting for the plane to arrive, for them to come out. But would they come…?
Yes, for sure… So we had a great time for a week, been to Prague and Wiener Neustadt concerts, then they left for their relatives in Netherlands.
I knew i needed to see more concerts. So hey… If Sal comes over to Vienna for some concerts, let’s fly to Florida, spend some time at his place and go see some shows. This is were Ingrid appeared, sending a mail on Wire, asking if someone knows where the boys are going to stay in Miami. When responding that i had no idea about that but asking for information if she gets to find it out, i realized her email ended in .at… Same as mine. Guessed right, so we ended up on the same plane. Joined by Markus, a friend of mine since Kindergarten days.
And there he was in the airport waiting for us, now having this strange feeling the other way round. Same as us.
As Ingrid joined me (or me her..? ?) the number of concerts raised from 3 to 5 - Tampa, Jacksonville, Miami, New Orleans and San Antonio. So we had great 3 weeks, the mileage on the road and the fun-mileage had a hot race.
Sometime before the Florida-Trip i met Nico on the net. Met her in Miami, that’s also when the way to meet people changed a little… Not only “online” friends, but we met a lot of other people like Henry, Otto, Elena, Oli, Adriana, Linda and Darcy to mention only some. Adriana travelled all the way up from Urugay to see the boys, Florida was the shortest trip for her to see them. And either in Jacksonville or Tampa she got pulled on stage by Bono. That’s how we got in contact as we took some great pics of her. Same for Linda, she travelled from Buenos Aires, got on stage already during ZooTV or Zooropa, she striked again in Florida.
After coming back home from Florida we knew there have to be even more shows we want to see. So we ended up in South America… You guess it - different place, same people. We ended up at our friends from South America with 6 shows in Rio, Sao Paolo and Buenos Aires. Maybe the best time I ever had so far, though it’s always hard to compare such special things with anything.
And in the meanwhile there’s the same group of people every tour… Some faces change, the places change and the amount of money you spend changes (that’s getting more and more everytime…).
You meet again after years, sometimes years of silence, sometimes years of endless chats, emails,… And you simply have a great time hanging out at the concerts, hotels,… Just having fun. So… See you all 2009..? But hey… That’s 2 years from now… Isn’t that a long time? Well… 
