TUESDAY, JUNE 13, 2017
Ahhhhh! Okay, so this isn’t a travel post, but I went to a Britney Spears concert in Taipei and it was so amazing, I HAD to blog about it. Another FET had shared with me that Britney Spears was coming to Taiwan! What?! Britney is doing a world tour? And she’s coming to Taiwan. I am somewhat excited to know that Taiwan is starting to get on the map. Music performers rarely stop on this small island. Usually, the closest location would probably be Hong Kong, so props to Taiwan stepping up in the world. After the I got over the shock, I immediately went online to see how to get tickets.
TYPE of TICKETS
Ticket prices ranged from 7680 NT to 1680 NT ($256 USD to $56 USD). Naturally, the further back your seat, the cheaper the ticket. The venue was at Taipei Nangang Exhibition Hall. It’s not an arena or stadium, so the hall is flat surfaced, meaning the likelihood of seeing Britney from the back is next to impossible. I thought a lot about it and some might call me crazy, but I wanted to go for the 7680 NT tickets to get as close to the front as I possibly could. I’m short and I already thought it was difficult to see from the 9th row at the Fifth Harmony concert. If I sat in the section all the way in the back, I’d definitely have to watch the concert from one of the big screens, but how is that different from watching the DVD version or watching it on your computer screen. Also, Britney was not touring North America. Her show is only available in Las Vegas. The flight from Newark to Las Vegas round trip plus a one night stay in Las Vegas would have cost hundreds of dollars, whereas my house to the venue cost 35 NT ($1 USD). I really think I got the better end of the deal. $256 is so much cheaper than if I were to see her in the U.S. People have told me that when Lady Gaga came to Taiwan, she inflated the prices a lot, so I guess I’m lucky Britney didn’t do that with her tickets.
HOW TO GET TICKETS
Buying concert tickets is an experience in itself. Taipei seemed like a last minute addition to her tour, so her tickets went on sale only a month before the concert date. You couldn’t buy tickets online from any computer. You had to go to an ibon machine at a 7-Eleven convenience store. My cousin agreed to help us get tickets so we met up with him. We got to 7-Eleven 45 minutes before the tickets were going to go on sale and there was already a person lined up to use the machine. Talking to him, he said this was his third 7-Eleven. He wanted to be the first in line and the other 7-Eleven already had people waiting to buy tickets. Well, we also wanted to be first in line, so we went across the street to another 7-Eleven. Veronica and I were super anxious. It was kind of hard getting tickets. The section we wanted sold out immediately and we kept getting kicked out because too many people were trying to access it and buy tickets. In the end, we got tickets in VIP 7 in the second row. We were happy with our seats.
BRITNEY IS IN TAIWAN
Okay, so the day finally arrived and despite the concert being on a Tuesday night, I’m super pumped for this concert. I also moved my Wednesday morning classes so I could sleep in Wednesday morning. I can’t stop expressing how amazing the whole night was. Veronica and I got there and we went all out, buying flower crowns and lights.
We also got a souvenir key chain from the tour shop. The whole night just felt like a throwback of me dancing and singing all the words to songs that I memorized to heart when I was teenager. One of the more notable moments was when Britney brought out on stage her real life boyfriend and kissed him on stage.
Britney performed so many songs. I know she most likely lip synced the songs, but whatever. She was amazing and the high after the concert was just unbelievable. So, if you’re ever in Taiwan, go see a concert! It’s so much fun. I was unable to get tickets to Ariana Grande in September, but I’m looking forward to going to the Road of Ultra Festival!
