My concert review from Portland, Oregon!

February 27, 2001.

Well, the day came finally and we woke up at 5 am. Jeesh, we were running around the house making sure we didn't forget anything as we were getting ready to go to their hotel! I grabbed the camera with 7, count 7 rolls of film along with my poster of the boys. My mom and her boyfriend went with me as we made our way to the bus stop to catch the 7:37 bus going to Portland. We stopped off at a little cafe to grab coffee first as we knew it would be a LONG day! We got to the bus stop as my mom and I couldn't contain how excited we were. We had gotten Nick, AJ and Howie all presents to take with us. We hopped onto the bus and headed for downtown. We made it to the hotel at around 9 am and took our place in front of the hotel with a few other random girls and waited. We were told that BSB were in fact staying there as they had seen Brian leave a few minutes before we had arrived. We waited and waited and waited, we actually in total waited over 9 hours outside the hotel! We were not allowed to go inside unless we were using the bathroom. We all got so hungry that I actually called for a pizza to be delivered OUTSIDE the hotel! We ordered pizza and a couple of 2 litres of Pepsi as the Bellhop told us it would still be a while before they would come out. We all waited, getting out our cameras and started singing along with a little CD player that someone had brought. Just then a bus pulled up along the sidewalk near the hotel, and another, and another! My mom and I just looked at eachother and smiled. It was finally happening, we were going to get to see the Backstreet Boys up close and in person! We couldn't even believe it. I took out the presents I had bought for Nick and AJ and not even knowing if I was going to give it to them, wrote my phone number down on them! (Good thing I did, but we'll not skip ahead!)

Well, 3 buses were loaded up with their dancers and bags apon bags of luggage! At around 4:30, maybe 5 pm the personal buses pulled around the corner, the shrieks of the crowd were piercing my ears so bad I thought my ears were bleeding! A black bus pulled to the curb as more luggage was brought out and loaded under the bus. A greyish with light blue stripes bus pulled up and a goldish-greyish colored bus pulled off to the side and waited for the other two to move. As we waited, (which seemed to take FOREVER!) we turned back towards the front door. We stood there and all of a sudden a bunch of girls started screaming..."Oh my god, It's AJ!". Sure enough I turn around and there's AJ coming towards his bus which was parked right beside us, I walked up to where he was and stuck my hand right out in front of him, holding his gift out to him and looked up at me and grabbed it with a sort of smile and got on the bus. He had practically ran from the hotel to his bus! I didn't even have enough time to get my camera up to snap a picture! But he had taken the gift I had gotten him and was on the bus with it heading towards the venue. Just then we learned some news that made my mom really upset. Howie D wasn't at the hotel! He had left at an earlier time without anyone seeing him! My mom was so upset that she started to cry! About 10 minutes later we were standing at the door AJ had come from and the doors swung open and there he was! The man I had waited for all day. Nick was walking down the hallway towards the outside! I took a deep breath as the outside doors swung open and he stepped out. A girl ran up to him, wrapped her arms around his neck and planted a kiss right smack on his cheek. He smiled weakly and continued walking. I saw my window of oppritunity and reached over, and tapped him lightly on the shoulder. He looked up at me, right into my eyes and I just looked at him and said, "Will you take this, please?" and held out his gift. He smiled and looked down at my hand and looked back up at me and said "Yes" and took the gift out of my hand and smiled again. The moment it took for this breif encounter seemed to play over and over in my head as he continued walking towards the bus. He walked and signed autographs at the same time, but he stopped, came to a COMPLETE stop just for me. I could have died right there! And yes, I did get a picture of him. Standing right in front of me actually! As soon as they get developed I will post them on here!(And no, I didn't scream or freak out to my own suprise!) He finally got onto his bus as I walked over there trying to get one last picture of him and there it was, sitting right on his table! The gift I had given to him! The bus pulled out and I just stood there in awe! I couldn't believe that that had just happened to ME! My mom and I walked back over to the door and my mom was a little angry that some girl pushed her out of the way while she was trying to get an autograph! That kind of made me angry too. We waited another 15 minutes as we thought Kevin would be the next one out. Boy were we wrong! All we knew was we looked behind us and saw a little guy with a hat on walking towards the other bus. My mom pushed herself up into the front right by the bus and waved to him! Yes, Brian waved to my mom! She was so happy. The last bus pulled out and I looked over at my mom and motioned for her to come with me. We walked up the street to catch the MAX Train to the venue. We reached the train and got on and we finally made it to the concert after we had already been standing outside for over 9 hours! My mom's poor boyfriend had waited out there all day with us just for those few minutes of happiness! As we walked up to the doors of the venue my mom couldn't believe how many people were there. All she could do was take deep breaths! I didn't make it any easier on her either, I kept saying, "Just think, Howie's inside.". Man did she get nervous! We walked inside, gave the guy our tickets and walked up to the t-shirt vendor guy! I bought a glow stick, a laminate and a t-shirt and a tour program! I won't even say how much I spent!!! My mom got a glow stick, t-shirt and a program! We'll just say that we walked in there with money and left with nothing but fond memories and empty pockets!

The concert was ready to start as we made our way to our seats! My mom was 1 section the the right of me. I sat there by myself wondering how loud it was going to get in that small arena! Man, the lights went down and I swear I went deaf for about the first 5 minutes of the show! Skippy from the local radio station came on stage and started the introduction of Krystal! She was really good. I liked her voice. After she was finished, she only sang 4 songs, the lights went back up and they started preparing the stage for the Backstreet Boys! I couldn't sit still!!! I sat there trying to be cool but then the lights went back down and the whole venue was filled with hyper screams and squeels! My ears started to get used to the loudness and the music started! Oh my god their show ROCKED! They put on the best show I have ever seen in my whole life! They played a complete 2 hour show here in Portland and let me tell you, it was the best 2 hours of my life! They sang alot of songs, everything from "The Call" to "Everybody (Backstreet's Back). One of my favorite parts was when they sang Howie's song, "How did I fall in love with you", he sounded absolutely amazing! He brought tears to my eyes. They went through all of the songs so amazingly! They sound so beautiful in concert it blew my mind!!! After the show I met back up with my mom next to the door and we went down into the parking garage and watched their buses leave! We were so sad that it was over, yet we had 6 rolls of film of just concert pictures!!!! We'll get them up too! Believe me, this page will be full of concert pics! Well, I think this is really long so if you want anymore details e-mail me and let me know.....

Thanks,

~*~*~*~Kimberly~*~*~*~

E-MAIL ~*~*Kimberly*~*~

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