Sevens weekend

The social event of the year. Sold out months in advance (although loads of tix going on Facebook in the last few days), and when a colleague offered us her tickets, I was super super excited. The Hong Kong Sevens. For years friends and I have talked about going and once they started having kids, we just never got round to it. It's basically three days of Koningsdag, plus networking. Loads of corporate boxes in the stadium and for weeks people (read: partners) at work had been talking about who would have how many allocations to invite clients.

We went on the Friday, which I guess can be described as quiet. The big countries don't start playing till 6pm and when we got there around 3pm, the South Stand (Party Central) was still pretty empty. As I really wanted to see the matches (read: Sonny Bill Williams, nr. 12 in pix below), we found seats a bit closer to the action but with a good view of the South Stand.

And despite being a bit quieter (or more sober at least) than the weekend days, it was really, really good fun. Some good rugby, a great atmosphere in the stadium, and easy to get booze and food. The opening ceremony included a dragon dance with a dotting of the eye ceremony, and to my excitement Brian O'Driscoll was one of the 'dotters'! David Hasselhoff was the other, but hey....I saw BOD!

Definitely something to do again next year, will mark the 2017 dates as soon as they're announced! And I'll make sure I won't end up like this fella :-)  (photo taken by a friend this arvo)