Loitering within tent takes on a whole new meaning at Glastonbury

Jul 10 2008

Trib reporter Katy Hallam went off to the Glastonbury Festival with a certain amount of trepidation - but came back having learned much. Especially about Somerset cider...

By Katy Hallam

THE BIG message at Glastonbury this year was 'leave no trace', but as a newbie to the ultimate festival experience a few things certainly made a lasting impression on me. Despite the eight hour car journey my friends and I arrived in high spirits - only to face a vertical hill with all our heavy belongings. But the sun was shining and Glastonbury looked far from the mud soaked misery that had often been described to me. It's amazing just how many comments you hear about the festival from people who have never been. Unprepared as always, it was only the day before I was due to leave at a sleepy 6am that I decided to practice putting the tent up and make sure it was all there. As I struggled to get bent tent pegs into the ground a neighbour decided to give my parents a little word of warning watch her, you don't know what goes on at these places, all the drugs and such like. So after weeks of soothing my parents worries they now had a clear picture in their minds of me running around on acid and foaming at the mouth. I'm glad to say that wasn't the case and to be honest I was expecting to see a lot more dodgy goings on than I did. So if Glastonbury isn't all about filling yourself with narcotics what is it about? Well from my experience it all depends on what your willing to make of it. Ok, so the visions of a sea of mud did become reality for a day but it didn't stop everyone going about their business and funnily enough the Kings of Leon did not find themselves playing to an empty field. This is England after all and a little English summer rain wasn't going to stop me or anyone else from having a ride on the big wheel or taking in the delights of the legendary Somerset Cider Bus. Drinking aside, I found my favourite musical moments clashing - I absolutely loved Hot Chip (especially when they brought out Wiley) and Crystal Castles were shockingly brilliant, but old classics from the likes of Leonard Cohen and Glen Tilbrook really stole the show for me. I'll never forget feeling slightly less than sober and swaying to Hallelujah on the Pyramid hill. But, even though I'm an avid music lover, I actually found myself taking on much more of the so-called Glastonbury 'experience'. Ok, so even I wasn't going to go as far as getting married at the famous Sunday mass ceremony but I did spend quite a bit of time in the Green Fields - the hippy hang-out. I spent my first night at the Stone Circle (think a mini version of Stonehenge) and watched lanterns with candles float away to the roar of the crowds. It's certainly a place to get back to nature, forget a little about the 9-5 hum-drum and just try something new like my friend who carved her own wooden spoon! But the aptly named trash city with its space pirates was my favourite post-music hang out. While I wasn't that interested in looking at the scrap-pile art, impressive as they were, the after hour clubs did bring a certain charm to the intergalactic red-light district. And before I knew it it was time to pack my dirty clothes and I realised that all my priorities had shifted. My biggest worry before I went was that I couldn't have a shower for six days, but when the time came to leave I could have happily foresaken a wash to fit in some of the things I just hadn't had time to do. It may be a massive cliche, but Glastonbury really did teach me a lot - not to be so vain, to make the most of every moment and too much Somerset Cider will make you very, very ill.