SquarkBlog

I woke up really early and went down really early for breakfast. After yesterday's horrible traffic jam and parking experience, I decided to plan to be at the Messe early. Being early, I tried not to ogle at the buffet spread, as I was really hungry. After ordering coffee, I made a beeline for the delicious buffet line and also ordered an omelette. After settling down in my seat, I played my first game of the day: Spot the Gamer. Never heard of this game? It's an observation and deduction game. Here's how it works: Look around the restaurant discreetly. Observe the people eating and getting food. Take note of their appearance. What are they wearing? What are they eating? Do they look cheerful? What are they talking about?  If they are alone, are they in deep thought thinking about games? Do they laugh out loudly? Do they have a beard? Make your own conclusions.

I met my friends the day before today. We had a great dinner and chatted about whats hot and whats not last night. Today, we continued the discussion at breakfast. This was THE day of the ultimate games meetup. Our breakfast had a lovely buffet spread. Delicious Swiss cheeses, fresh fruit juices, sausages and salami. Ate a lot and had nice coffee. I secretly tried to spot other gamers in the breakfast room. One or two tables could be occupied by gamers. Not sure, though. We left the hotel around 9 am, and after a short drive, got caught in a traffic jam near the Essen Messe. Shyam thought this was strange, as usually, being a Thursday, the first day of Essen Spiele was normally pretty quiet. We were in a jam which nearly rival a KL rush hour jam, but more civilized. What was going on? What made it worse was the really fast-changing traffic lights which we encountered along the way. I guessed they were not used to this type of heavy traffic. When we finally reached the Messe, there were tons of people! Queues were building up at every entrance! What was going on? I dropped Shyam and daughter off by one of the entrances, as the queues were disconcerting and I was directed to a very distant car park. I found a parking space really far away from any of the entrances into the Messe. It was a long walk to my first Essen Spiele, but as I reached the nearest entrance. there was a buzz of excitement amongst the people there. Everyone was in a jovial mood. Ahh...the group effect of mass endorphin release...