It was essentially pandemonium:
We were sent in circles by police directing the foot traffic. It felt a lot like Labyrinth, except without David Bowie. Then, periodically, the police would say we had to turn around and go another way. It was all very confusing -- one would think that if an event happens every year, there'd be a logical way to direct the crowd. If one did think that, however, that one would be wrong.
Thankfully, Cliff and I are both pretty laid-back, so we just wandered along with the crowds, devising a plan to get us as close to the tree as possible. We ended up pretty close -- just around the corner from the J.Crew in Rockefeller Center -- however, because of the angle of the buildings, we couldn't actually see the tree or the stage on which the performers were. We could, however, see a monitor showing these things.
We were amused by the atrocious lip-synching, and decided that it was a bit of a backhanded compliment to be asked to perform for a free outdoor event like this (unless you are a Rockette -- the Rockettes are awesome), because it means that you're not a big enough deal anymore to make people riot. We imagined how much more ridiculous the crowd would be if, say, Justin Bieber were a performer.
Also, apparently Annie Lennox has a Christmas album and it sounds exactly like one would imagine an Annie Lennox Christmas album to sound like.
At the crucial tree-lighting moment, the monitor was stuck on a stock image of "Christmas of Rockefeller Center". There was booing from our section of the crowd (but not us, because we're classy like that).
Then, a minute later, there was chaos. We managed to work our way toward the tree so Cliff could take a picture with his fancy iWhatever gadget (all photos in this post were taken by him):
One way to tree.
Some people started pushing and yelling things and I was all like, "Dude. Christmas."
Anyway, I'm glad that I went. I had fun, felt Christmas-y, and wouldn't place it totally in the "never again" category, but I don't feel like I need to make it an every-year tradition, either.
In other news, Brooklyn is pretty.
