Womad, take a bow

Adrian Hanack took his baritone sax to the people at Meute’s hugely popular Saturday gig on the Brooklands Stage at Womad. The German techno marching band was one of the big hits of the three-day festival that made a spectacular return to New Plymouth’s Brooklands Park at the weekend, with 15,000 ticket holders attending each day.

Womad is famous for many things it does a bit differently and one of those things is that kids under-12 get in free with a paying adult.

So, unlike many other festivals, at Womad there are times when you might feel you have wandered into St Peppers Lonely Hearts Club daycare, or some such thing. It’s pretty special.

The kids are bedazzled in face paint, headwear and dubious fashion choices. They’re bobbing about on their little legs to the beat and trying out juggling sticks, weird food and, of course, climbing all over the Womad letters.

On Saturday one of those kids was my son, who came along with me to broaden his musical and cultural horizons and the promise of a fizzy drink.

I was a bit nervous about taking my son as I have taken him and his sister to Womad a couple of times before and always regretted it.

But that was when they were in prams and could barely last 10 minutes before needing food or drink or their dribble wiped from the most unexpected places.

It was my hope this time would be different. My son is 8 years old now and I thought we could experience the festival like two mates would. You know, have a great time while looking like we absolutely did not want to be there.

Things were looking promising when we stumbled into an area of incredibly good-looking young adults surrounded by children that I initially mistook for a hipster spawning ground.

It was in fact the Womad Kidzone, which had taken over the entire Brooklands Zoo. There were craft stations, puppet shows, an ice cream truck, story corners and some other empowering stuff.

It was an awesomely unexpected effort for the sake of hundreds of kids who weren’t contributing anything to the cost of setting it up. I was then, and remain now, genuinely impressed.

Unfortunately my son wasn’t so keen on participating in any of the child-directed play stuff or painting his own Womad flag. He just wanted his promised fizzy drink.

From there, and even though we had eaten lunch at home, we went to the food area because you can’t go to Womad and not eat something delicious. That’s my rule.

Trying to navigate through the crowds with a distracted 8-year-old boy was challenging. By the time we got to the tempura mushroom stall both of us were openly questioning whether parents and kids could divorce each other.

Once we had the mushrooms (which were delicious) we sat down and listened to who I think was ACAPOLLINATIONS, though I couldn’t be sure as I had foolishly given my programme to my sister just minutes before.

Nonetheless I began to relax and contemplate settling in for an afternoon of inspiring cultural enlightenment. Then my son complained that one of the singers must be sick.

‘‘At least they sound like they are being sick,’’ he said.

Of course they didn’t sound like that. They sounded lovely. The main problem for my son, I guess, was he had finished his can of drink and we both instantly realised that meant it was time to go. We had been there 40 minutes.

Luckily we live close by and were home so quickly I was still chewing on a tempura mushroom when we opened the front door. An hour later I took my 4-year-old daughter.