Moment of Madness heads to Jozi

Where did I put my left shoe? 

That was the question I asked myself 5 minutes before I was due to leave for King Shaka Airport to meet up with the rest of the East Coast Radio contingent who had been nominated in this year's MTN Radio Awards in Sandton, Johannesburg.

Much joy and celebration might I add had already taken place at ECR house as the we had received a bountiful 12 nominations in a varied range of categories.  Damon and myself met up with Thrishni Subramoney ( who herself was up for 2 nominations!) - and we sat down for a pre flight beer.

I recommend this for anyone who gets pre flight jitters. Soon the rest of the guys and gals arrived and we left for the hustle and bustle of the concrete jungle that is Johannesburg. 

And that's when the running started. A few of us were late for the Gautrain and had to sprint to get to it from arrivals in what Jonathan Lumley ( promotions and competitionsmanager extraordinaire ) described as, wait, what was that again... Oh yes! "One minute."

One minute. Needless to say we missed it, and we looked like a group of teenage girls and boys chasing down a half price sale at a clothing shop. You should have seen the attempts to carry bags and maintain a decent speed. Shocking.

Anyway we waited for the next train- and while doing so, programming manager Naveen Singh decided it would be a good idea if we charged our phones. So yours truly hooked our phones up on a wall plug point. Right by the train stop. Its illegal. Apparently. Ever clever Naveen got me to seek confirmation of this infringement from a supervisor, thus distracting the law for long enough to get at least half a bar on our phones. 

Then more running. The Gautrain arrived early - and Naveen shouted through the girls bathroom entrance door to Thrishni and Natarah to move it. Oh yeah I forgot to tell you. We were so late that the girls needed to start changing for the event in the bathrooms. I'm not even kidding. Half dressed and fully flustered they hopped onto the train and we jetted off to Sandton. Home of Porsches and overpriced coffee.

We checked in, super showered ( Damon took around 5.5 seconds to shower, shave, and get snazzed up. I lost my shoe, again, and spent another couple of minutes cursing the shoe gods until I found it. In my bag. 

We headed through to a local restaurant to meet up with the rest of the Kagiso group, a sizeable and loud bunch of talented individuals, most of whom I have had the pleasure of growing up listening to and being inspired by. And here I was , kippy McCall hob nobbing with them. If only they knew how humbled I was to be chilling with them. Drinking red bull and vodka. Oh that reminds me. Red bull and vodka makes you jump around. A lot.

We all headed through to the Sandton Convention centre where the awards began. And so too did the sweaty palms. 

As the categories were announced, loud cheering and quiet groans of disappointment echoed through the room. The only thing louder than Anele the host's chirps were some of the outfits worn by a few individuals.  Medics were outside treating many who were burnt by the entertaining and hilarious host.

I'm not going to elaborate on every category,  but go straight to ours. We lost the first one. That sucked. We hugged each other, and reminded ourselves that just being there, just seeing our name on the big, and I mean BIG screen (as Jonathan remarked "the ideal Angry birds size screen " ) - was incredible and satisfying enough. 

A few awards later, including the amazing YOUNG ACHIEVER'S award which was given to our very special and talented Seema Diahnan,  our second category came up... Best stunt in the Commercial Radio category!

We were up against some really tough stuff. Including our very own Big Walk... I'm not sure if it was a yelp or a scream, but when they announced that we won, I let out this primal cry, like a poodle that had its paw trampled.... And much celebration ensued.

I think we actually celebrated more than the bigger categories did! It didn't matter! We worked hard for it, and by George, we were going to go on about it! And we did. A lot.

Anyway.

We picked up our award, took a few thousand photos, phoned the loved ones and celebrated the night away. I think. I was feeling a bit festive later in the evening and things got hazy.

The next day I fell out my bed, realised that my skull is two sizes too small for my swollen brain and chowed brekkie. We boarded the Gautrain, then the flight home and even got a shout out from the captain about our achievement!

And that's the end of that. Oh ya - the theme of the awards was "always on" - as in, radio is always on.

What the theme for the ECR team adventure could have been, had there been one, was:  "Always on...the run"

Well done East Coast Radio.

I love Radio,

Till next time.

Cheers

Follow me on Twitter : @jasonmccall01

Click here for more photos.