by Rory

I am listening to "Under a Blood Red Sky" at the moment and it brought memories rushing back about this concert.
My mother is Irish and we have a large family all over Ireland. We visit from South Africa every year. I have an Uncle and Aunt living in Cork and they suggested we go and see this show. At the tender age of 12 it was my first big show, so you must know the impression it left on me for life. We arrived with no tickets hoping to get at the door. Now, there is a twist in the story, as I mentioned we traveled from SA to be with family in Ireland. We flew through London Heathrow, when at Heathrow who do we see in the departure terminal..U2. So my mother being the feisty Irish woman that she is goes up to the band and introduces herself. They then proceed to enter into a politically charged discussion about apartheid in SA, it is a little known fact that Bono was passionate about this issue at the time. We then parted ways, undoubtedly leaving an impression, this crazy Irish woman from Africa .
So now we find ourselves at the gate of the Cork gig, my mother starts telling the guy at the gate that the band has invited us and that they must let us in. They get The Edge to come down, I know what you are thinking, this sounds ludicrous. I assure you that this is not fabricated to any degree. Eventually they let us in for free, can you believe this? We sat about 20 meters to the left of the stage. This was one of the defining moments in my lifelong love affair with music.
I remember after the concert the people were filing through the passages within the arena taking time as it does. They all started singing the chorus to "40", "how long, how long must we sing this song".
Amazing experience.

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