The Set-Up

The Beginning: The Best Place to Start

I am an undergraduate studying Events Management, so for my summer (all 4 months of it) I decided to give up my time by working at some festivals.

The Pros:

Free entry to festivals

Free food to keep you working hard

A lot of training, both on the job and pre-festival

It might just be me but I feel a little bit special to know that I got one of the sort after places at some of the most popular festivals

I'm working with my other half, so lots of time to make some memories

The deposit, you get it back, after your last festival, so for me, about September, just in time to help me endure my second year at uni

The Cons:

Work, 24 hours of it to be precise

No pay (all the money goes to the charity I am working for)

A night shift, 8 hours of working OVERNIGHT, I am a little afraid of this one, because if I fall asleep and am caught I could be thrown out of the festival and black listed

The stuff you have to buy, the tent, the rucksack, the sleeping bags

The deposit, yes it comes under both a pro and a con, you don't get any interest on the money that was asked for back in March, you just get it back, but all interest does go to the charity so it's not a bad old world after all

The Details:

Download Festival: June 8th-14th, not that we knew we had to be there Tuesday until the beginning of this week, yes just a week before the festival, there had been rumours, rumblings if you will of this change because everyone arrives on the wednesday and seeing as we are working as the wristbanders we bloody well needed to be there before everyone needed to have a nice wristband strapped onto them.

Glastonbury: June 21st-28th, yes this one is a week, because for the first year Glastonbury is allowing people to park up on the Tuesday night after 9pm to get them off the roads. So to avoid this we are all being asked to be down and registered on the Monday. Working on tickets for this, checking them under the UV light and checking faces to pictures. This is the one I feel most privileged to have gotten a place for, so many people want to go, its sold out and people turn to the working route just to be there even if they miss 24 hours spread over 3 days at least they can say: Glasto '10, yeah I was there.

Reading: August 25th-30th. A shorter spell but one I know very little about at the moment other than a small gem from the trainer at my training session... 'If you are working Reading, learn the signal for violence, you'll need it.' Which as a young girl just fills me with excitement.... yeah right.

And my corporate venture.....

End of the Road: September 8th-13th, I have no clue about what I am doing, where I am sleeping, how long I am working or even if I get fed... that's because I am working for the festival organisers, purely as a favour to a friend who is going but didn't want to go alone, but there was no way I was going to pay for a festival I knew none of the bands playing there. If I'm not paying for Glastonbury I'm not paying for this.

And so it really begins...