Those photos are ones I took last year on the day that Tribe opened for registration. Now, I had no plans on going to the mas camp that day since I had made many trips prior to the opening of the mas camp for registration to view costumes. Tribe's claim that online registration would make the process quicker and easier had me confident that I could register at my computer without leaving the office.
Imagine my frustration when at the time the website was up for registration it crashed! I guess they did not anticipate that the site would take so many hits in such a short space of time, and as I started at my computer willing the page to load faster I realised I had to get to the mas camp as soon as possible or I could forget registering in my first choice section.
Well, when we got to the mas camp (my husband and best friend in tow) we were greeted with the scene pictured above. A mass of people, some waiting for hours, were lined up patiently waiting for the gates to open. Some were sitting on the pavement with laptops on their knees, most likely hoping that the site would spring to life before the gates opened.
Being the resourceful person that I am, I made my way to the front of the crowd (yeah, I skipped the line!) and positioned myself for when the gates opened, all the time chatting with the guard who was used to seeing my face as I had been to the mas camp all week. The end result was that as the gates open I was able to slip in and went about registering my friend and myself, ignoring the comments from all the angry people who were most likely in disbelief that I was so boldface.
So, with the introduction of the TLC card I am very curious to see how registration plays out this year. With the TLC card, we were also assigned a password which we have to use with the number on the TLC card to login to the website for registration. The thing is, when I enquired if we can register at the mas camp I was informed that you will be registering via computer at the mas camp as well. I guess they have even more confidence that the website will not crash this year, maybe that's why they are doing registration in phases.
Since I will be in the first phase of registration be sure I will report on how the process went. I find it very disheartening though that to get the costume you like, all this thought, time and effort has to go into registering. Gone are the days when you could take your time to deliberate over a costume, or wait until you get paid to register or even wait to see what the other bands have to offer. I can only foresee that it will get worse, with Poison gone space in one of the more popular Carnival bands will be at a premium and open the doors for some sort of corruption. Don't be surprised if TLC cards go up for sale!
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