Intro:
“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a
miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle”.
Champions League
Final ticket.
How
do you get Champions League Final tickets? Easy. But not simple. This is a story
worthwhile a separate chapter in my autobiography. Here it is, a “Step-by-step
guide to buy a Champions League Final ticket”. This is a story of how you deal
with uncertainty, ambiguity, trying to turn “unknowns” into “less of unknowns”
and gradually to “knowns”.
1. Around January February 2018, I
realised that Champions League Final will be held in Kyiv, the capital of my
homeland. This is one of those things you want to do in your lifetime. Living
away from Europe for a while, you are even more desperate to see this kind of
events. In 2017, I was considering going to Cardiff for the weekend to watch
the final, but it would have been a logistical nightmare for me, so I did not even
try. This time, it is in Ukraine and I need to go.
2. I properly registered for the draw
on UEFA website before 15 March 2018. A couple of weeks after I learned that I
was not selected to win the tickets. Frustrated? Of course. Gave up? No fucking
way.
3. Around March, I agreed the timing
of my holidays which had to be around Champions League date of 26 May 2018. I
booked flights from Mauritius to Kyiv well ahead of (Ha Ha) the supporting fans
of Real Madrid and Liverpool, i.e. when the competition was in its 1/8 stage
(Round of 16).
4. As the tournament progressed, I
started to look out for the tickets being offered online by resellers. That did
not look promising at all as the nominal prices for Category 4 ticket of € 70
and Category 1 ticket of € 450 turned into € 800 and up to € 3,000 – € 4,000 if
wrapped into hospitality packages.
5. I could not reconcile in my head
how you actually buy tickets online from a reseller, how do you physically
obtain the tickets from someone, what are the guarantees? Having read the
feedbacks from a number of websites-resellers, it seemed like a virtually
certain opportunity to be disposed of cash without getting anything in return.
6. Beginning of May, as the
participants of the final became known, I sent the message into space, spread
the word around and sent a request on facebook to see whether there are any
ways of buying tickets at a reasonable price. There were some leads, and I
appreciate the responses and assistance from some of my friends and colleagues.
Did I get the ticket? No, not just yet.
7. It is worth mentioning that I also
informed my wife about my intention to visit the key game of the year in
European football. When she learned about the value of potential cash outflow
from our family’s budget, we ended up at the new spiral of “Hello, we are
getting divorced again!” So, that was another issue to manage along the road to
Kyiv.
8. So, I flew out from Mauritius to
Kyiv on 20 May, a week before the final, still without an idea of how I get to
the Olimpiyskiy stadium. I started talking to my friends-fans who were regulars
on football games and who would follow Dynamo abroad and within the country. I
got to know that None! None of the people I knew were attending / planning to
attend the game. The reasons included: “too expensive”, “football has gone mad
and too commercial and we are against it”, etc etc. My friends advised to not
purchase anything online, as this is a guaranteed flop. And the last thing I
would want to do is to have the funds written off my bank account, not getting
anything in return and completely ruining my well-deserved less than two-week
holiday break.
9. Thursday, 2 days before the Final.
I am meeting an old friend from Deloitte who advised that I should try buy it
just before the kick off. Statistically speaking, some of the resellers would
not be able to sell all tickets, and they would drop prices even below face
value. Though great as an idea, I did not have balls of steel and the luxury of
previous Champions League Final experiences, to wait until the starting minutes
of the game, to look for the desperate crooks hoping to recover at least their
cost of investment. I had lots of scheduled meetings with friends, and leaving
the ticket purchase to the last moment would completely ruin my quality time
with friends.
10. Friday, 1 day before the final.
This is a story in itself. I meet another friend from Deloitte with whom we
have not met for 10 years if not more. If you have seen the film “Perfume: The
Story of a Murderer” and its opening scene, which basically tells the story of
how the string of random events result in something specific and if you try to
piece it all together looking forward, there is no way you can predict how the
events will unfold. You can only unbundle the events looking backwards in
history. Anyways, this friend asked me to bring a plate from Mauritius. The story
goes as follows. She met with a client and during the casual chat she learnt
that her client was collecting small souvenir plates from various countries he
had visited. Unfortunately, a plate from Mauritius got broken which deeply
upset the guy. A friend then suggested that she might get one from Mauritius
having myself in mind as a potential plate supplier in the short-term future. I
did agree to bring a Mauritius plate. Now I was sitting with a friend
exchanging a 10-year summary of our lives in a 45 minute conversation. I
revealed my intention of wanted to go the game. She said that two of her
colleagues went to the stadium yesterday (2 days before the game) and purchased
tickets for €500 each. You should check it out yourself, she said. I finally felt
back on the hunt. I finally felt the smell of blood in the air! It is here
somewhere, I am about to get it! I walked with a friend down to the Stadium
which happened to be just next to her work.
11. I am now next to the Stadium,
looking out for the greedy resellers offering tickets for 3-5 times the nominal
price. There was a group of people, looking like they have something I need.
Now I realise that I do not even know how the tickets look like. And if I was
given a counterfeit, I would not be able to differentiate between a genuine one
and a fake one. So, I come up to the group of these people and start talking to
them. They speak German and Polish between themselves. Talking English to me.
We start conversation in German / English. They offer Category 1 tickets for €
1,000 and Category 3 for € 700. I feel I am about to finally buy a ticket. But
not just yet. I looked at the tickets, I could see which the layers of
protection are being used. And they seem real. They seem genuine. I start
talking to the younger guy in German. I pushed the price down from € 650 for
Cat 3 down to € 500. But I need to go to meet the guy in the hotel Hyatt in the
downtown Kyiv (it is actually the heart of Kyiv not just downtown). Not a bad
place to stay for a gang of international German-Polish crooks, I’d say. So,
7pm is the time we would meet and do the transaction.
12. I have scheduled a meeting with my
university friends for 6:30 pm same day. I had now a few hours to prepare cash
for the ticket and relax a bit before the meeting. I called one of my
university friends, and if his time permitting to accompany me to go to Hyatt
in case we might need some muscle power to protect my genuine right to attend
the game. He happily agreed and I walked to down to Maidan Nezalezhnosti to meet
up with him. I had about 30 minutes before he would come over. I went to
McDonald’s, tired and wanted to take a breather, sat at one of the tables
outside, next to an aged couple most likely from Spain.
13. As I was sitting next to the
couple, I thought they must have been Real Madrid fans. I knew that a few
thousand Real Madrid fans refused to come to the Final in Kyiv as the flight
prices to the capital of Ukraine sky-rocketed and rental costs went absolutely
insane, as the owners probably wanted to earn a few years worth of rental over
a few days time. So, as my natural curiosity suggested, I asked them how much
they spend on their Champions League Final tickets. They did not speak English,
so I had to converse this out of my shattered and neglected Spanish. This made
it more interesting and luckily, they were interested in the conversation. Now,
the guy pulls out a transparent file with 4 tickets inside. And I see that he
starts to offer 2 of them to me for €650 each. I tell him that I have an option
to buy for € 500 within an hour. But just in case, he has written his phone
number on a piece of McDonald’s ad, and explained that we could meet tomorrow
at 9am next to Палац Спорту or Sport Palace metro station.
Ok, I said, at least I have a Plan B (see exhibit 1).
14. My
friend arrived, and we walked together to Hyatt which was just a few blocks
away from McDonald’s. Unlike me, my friend had a ticket reserved for him by his
mate who was residing in the UK. So, he was totally relaxed, having finished his
working week, ready for drinking tonight and for football game tomorrow. We
walked in Hyatt, I called the ticket owner – international барига
Jimmy. We sat in the lobby, opposite the guy. I finally understood the
set up: Hyatt hosted the Champions League organising committee, and my guy was
being one them, had access to sponsors’ tickets. My guy барига Jimmy
(what a name for a German of Polish origin, I thought) behaved in a very
strange way. He sent me messages on whatsapp asking not to approach him and later
to leave the hotel and wait for him outside. But he also alerted me to see Luis
Figo who just arrived as part of a football legends gang, which was so cool to
see the 2000 Golden Ball Winner and recipient of a pig’s head missile at Camp
Nou when he traded Barcelona for Real Madrid. My new friend Jimmy came out of
the hotel to say that he does not have Cat 3 ticket for € 500 but he has Cat 1
ticket for €1,000. And if I need a Cat 3 ticket for € 500, I need to come back
in a hour. Fucking hell, ok then. What else can I say.
15. My patience level was going down.
Luckily I was having a good time with my university mates at Prorizna, telling
them stories and sharing our experiences at school and beyond. But international
Барига Jimmy was
making me nervous. The game is tomorrow and I still do not have the ticket. I
took Uber to go to see Jimmy in his hotel. He did not return the call but he
texted me to say that he went out to dinner in town. He fucked me up twice and
my hope was fading out. I could no longer trust the guy and I was getting
desperate. We parted with university mates and I went to my friends to stay
overnight.
16. On the game-day 26 May 2018, I woke
up around 6am. I pulled out the note written by a Spanish couple. I put in the
phone number into my phone, adding Spain country code. The photo of the guide
popped out in whatsapp. Huuuh. It is a genuine number, Jesus F. Christ! I send
him a text to confirm for the meeting at Sport Palace at 9am. I got a response
back Cat 3 for € 500 at 9am. I am off to the metro. I am going out of the metro
station at Sport Palace and see the couple waiting for me…
P.S. The game is a separate story.
P.S.S. Facebook pick-up Spanish guy
profile and suggested him as a friend. This guy turned out to be a big Real
Madrid fan and had photos for the past 10-15 years with all players and
managers, including both Ronaldo from Brasil, Christiano Ronaldo, Zidane,
Morinho, and all of the other big names in the club.
