Homesick and Harmony

Eighteen years ago on this date, November 18th, I had one of those “OMG!” experiences. A “Top 10” life moment. The kind you never forget.

It was Sunday, November 18, 2001. I was living in Hong Kong with my fiancée.

We had been living there for nearly a year and were still climatizing. We weren’t tourists anymore but we didn’t feel like residents of this exotic city either. We were somewhere in the middle.

We were there long enough to have stopped gawking at the skyscrapers, and had ceased staring at freshly plucked chickens hanging from street-side stalls. The sight of those chickens had become part of a familiar cityscape. Yet we were still converting Hong Kong dollars into U.S. dollars in our heads every time we made a purchase.

It had been 68 days since the September 11th terrorist attacks in the U.S. A painfully raw time for every American. For us, it was surreal in a different sense.

Living on the opposite side of the globe we were removed from the collective grieving in America. We were an 18-hour flight from being able to hug our family and friends. 

The national mourning period in China was strangely brief and life in Hong Kong was rapidly reverting to business-as-usual. So 10 weeks later, our emotions were still gashed. 

We were home sick and longed for anything familiar. And comfortable. And Western.

So when we learned Elton John was squeezing a stop in Hong Kong into his world tour we grabbed tickets as fast as we could. The concert was a last-minute decision that we anticipated with great excitement.

On the day of the concert, November 18th, I jumped into my favorite weekend garb. Jeans. T-shirt. And a New York Yankees baseball cap. I had bought the ball cap a year earlier while attending a World Series game in the old Yankee Stadium (but deep down I was still a Detroit Tiger fan).

We hopped on a bus to the venue (no one drives in Hong Kong) and 40-minutes later we arrived at the venue located on the other side of Hong Kong Island.

The venue was less a concert hall and more of an auditorium on steroids. Our seats weren’t great – midway up the risers at the far back of the venue.

Still, we relished in Elton’s songs which we had known since childhood. The music and his piano were nostalgic and familiar. We belted out the lyrics as Elton banged on the keys.

Crocodile Rock: “Me and Suzie had so much fun…Holding hands and skimming stones…Had an old gold Chevy and a place of my own…But the biggest kick I ever got….Was doing a thing called the Crocodile Rock…”.

Rocket Man: “I'm a Rocket Mannnn…Rocket Mannnn…Burnin' out his fuse up here alone...”.

Philadelphia Freedom had an especially sweet ring that night: “Oh Philadelphia freedom, shine on me, I love you… Shine the light…Shine the light, Shine the light…Phil-A-Del-Phia freedom, I love-ve-ve you, yes I DOOOOO!”.

It was an eruption of pure emotion and American pride. Pent-up energy and the joy of being Alive!

On that night Sir Elton was an honorary American. Bring it on Elton!

Now, it’s important to know that concert audiences in Hong Kong are very different than those in the United States. By comparison Hong Kong concert goers are tame. At least they were at that concert venue on that night.

Everyone sat in their seats. There was no spontaneous dancing. No clapping to the beat. There was very little singing. And the applause was more polite than spirited. No one flooded into the aisle. They had barriers to prevent crowds from gathering during the show.

The energy was lifeless. We were witnessing one of the all-time great musicians in Hong Kong, Asia’s World City, and the audience barely had a heartbeat. It was sapping our own energy and we needed this night to be unabashedly merry.

Midway through the concert, I had an idea: Let’s go down and stand by the stage. Who cares if everyone else was behaving as if they had come to see a Broadway play not a rock-n-roll concert.

As Elton started playing “Bennie and the Jets” we made our move. “Hey kid, shake it loose together…the spotlight's hitting something…that's been known to change the weather.”

We nonchalantly left our seats, shuffled past a line of legs and kneecaps along our row, and ambled down the steps of the risers to the main floor. 

Elton kept tickling the ivories and singing those time-honored lyrics: “She's got electric boots, a mohair suit. You know I read it in a magaziiiiiine, oh, yeah! B-B-B-Bennnnie and the Jettttssssssss.” 

None of the ushers tried to stop us and we hit the main floor unfettered. In an instant our posture changed. We stood tall walking as conspicuously as we could with purpose. Like we were friends of the band.

We walked right past an usher and moved a temporary barricade as if we were friends of the band. She flinched for an instant at our brazenness but she couldn’t stop us. We were determined to get to the stage.

We arrived in the front row and our hands were touching the stage as Sir Elton finished with crescendo and flare: “I mean, where do you get a mohair suit anyway?...Ah man… B-B-B-Bennnnie! B-B-B-Bennnnie! Bennnnie and the Jettttssssssss!”

We made it. But I was certain our seconds were numbered. It would be a matter of moments before an usher would tap us on the shoulder, ask to see our ticket stubs and send us back to the nosebleed section. But no one did.

When the next song started I mustered the courage to look back over my shoulder, convinced I’d see an usher marching toward us with flashlight in hand. Nope. Instead I saw something totally unexpected. A sea of Hong Kongers pressing their way down the main aisle heading toward the stage. We had started a trend.

We stood next to the stage the rest of the night playing the air guitar and banging the stage with our fingers like a giant piano.

Our eyes were glued on Elton. He who was just out of our reach. We could barely see his hands, moving so fast. They were a blur as he played a billion notes. And we knew every single one.

By the time the concert finished our vocal chords were shredded. Elton left the stage and came back out for a one-song encore: Candle in the Wind. Who doesn’t love that ballad?

When he walked off the stage it wasn’t clear if he was coming back for another song. But I knew he wouldn’t end a concert with a ballad. So I started screaming my head off. As hoarse as I was, I may have been louder than the collective applause of an audience of 15,000+.

I saw Elton just off-stage getting ready for one final song. The crowd was on its feet. After a few breath-stealing moments Sir Elton finally stepped back on stage.

I couldn’t contain my excitement and mindlessly started shouting “Reg Strikes Back! Reg Strikes Back!”

“Reg Strikes Back” was an album Elton released in 1988. It was a comeback album for him. The "Reg" in Reg Strikes Back refers to Elton's birth name, Reginald Kenneth Dwight.

The odds were pretty good that I may have been the only person at that concert that knew this obscure fact about Elton’s career.

So there I was, standing next to the stage, hands waving and shouting “Reg Strikes Back.”

Elton finally steps back on stage and starts strolling toward his piano. Like the great showman he is, he scanned the entire crowd as if to say thank you to see every last person in the audience. He scanned the front row and looked in my direction. He makes eye contact with me and deviates from his path to the piano and walks over to me.

 I’m still screaming like a kindergartener on a playground, “Reg Strikes Back!! Reg Strikes back!!” He smiles. Then I see his eyes look up at my New York Yankees cap. And he says, “New York Baby!”

 And he high-fived me.

Yep. Elton John high-fived me.

The last song of the night he played “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me.” I don’t remember anything about it. I was on a different planet. Those hands with a billion notes that moved so fast across the piano they were blurry to the eye.

I had high-fived one of the greatest musicians of all-time.

3 Takeaways:

1. Harmonize in the moment.
2. Savor your life memories.
3. You better get back, honky cat.

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Published by David Pinkley, Jet Fuel for Your Career?. Resume writing. Career & interview coaching. Leadership development. Retained executive search. When you’re ready to get to the next level. Let’s talk.