From the moment the y-toppians woke up today, there was an exciting buzzing going around the place. Today was a day of new events and experiments; a day of doing things that had never been done before in the Y-top history. The first Y-top Festival ever had been an event that a lot of people had been looking forward to and had been working very hard on. The event had even reached some local newspapers, magazines and (so we heard) a radio station. Clearly, this meant that a lot of preparation had to go into this.
From early in the morning, everyone and every Roots-team had been assigned a task (for example cleaning, welcoming or organizing catering) and the whole hostel was turned into a construction site where every stone was shifted to prepare for the festival. Several special groups called ‘Apples’ (nobody really knows why) were even more busy with the event. Among these groups were for example the musicians, who had to create an entire concert within 24 hours for the festival, and the security team, who made sure that the everyone was safe and that the collision between the y-toppians and unknown guests from outside went smoothly.
From 2 pm people started to arrive, the Killarney School of Music members among them, so the excitement was building even more. The whole field in front of the hostel was turned into a festival ground with stands where people could present their personal projects or could share creative ideas. Soon, people were all walking around with beautiful paintings on their bodies and awesome hair braids. At the same time the concert was beginning in the Tree House.
Most of the y-toppians were blown away by the first performance of the Killarney School of Music, where some fantastic Irish folk music was played. With every fast Irish ‘slide’ we started dancing and clapping. With every beautiful, heartfelt song (Caledonia was one of them) we shared some deep sighs and tears. After thanking the school with a massive applause, it was time for the Y-top musicians to share their prepared songs. There were amazing self-written songs, existing songs that fitted perfectly with the Y-top 2016 vibe and even a poem by Trident, accompanied by dance and music, that described in a funny, creative and beautiful way what this year’s Y-top Gathering had been about until now.
There might not have been as many people at the festival as we had hoped, but at the end of the day we could all agree that it had been a very very successful festival anyways. After all, we didn’t do it for the amount of people who came or to convince people how cool the Y-top is. It was for ourselves; to feel proud and happy by sharing the passion and experiences we’d been working on the past 10 days. And of course to have a lot of fun. And that definitely was the case.
The evening started off with a bang with dinner made by the Dutchies. Many people especially expressed their enormous thanks for the desert of Dutch apple pie, whipped cream and ice cream. A good party mood was already set in motion by the Dutch, crazily singing and dancing along to Dutch songs while cooking and serving the food. This was perfect, since the rest of the evening was all about the annual Y-top party that happens every year.
And every year the y-toppians prove yet again that nothing but a good spirit (and some good music) is needed for a fantastic party.