Lady Gaga at the Mall of Asia Arena

A few days ago my friend sent me a message, “Do you want to watch the Lady Gaga concert? I have an extra ticket.” Let me tell you right now I’m not one of the ‘little monsters’ but I immediately replied, “YES!!!”

Even though I’m not a big Lady Gaga fan I do know all her hits. But then you would have to live in a cave not to know her songs, right? I do admire her hard work and talent to rise to where she is now.

I was also excited to see the brand new Mall of Asia Arena. We watched the concert last night, day two of the Born This Way Ball Tour in Manila.

Your ticket will tell you which entrance to go to. I was very impressed with the high level of security which made it look like an airport just with many, many doors thus there were no lines at all.

Your ticket is scanned and the shield opens.

There were snack bars on all levels.

On the second level there was Krispy Kreme and several ladies selling Chef Tony’s popcorn.

Sections were well indicated on the ceiling.

This was the view from lower box section 220 blue. I managed to take one picture of the front act, DJ Zedd before the usher led us out again. By the way, I really, really enjoyed his music.

Usher: “Ummm, ma’am your tickets are for yesterday’s show.”
Us: “Whaaaaaaat??!?!??!”

Breathe in, breathe out. After a calm and collected call to the one who gave us the tickets we were then brought to the 3rd floor where the corporate suites were. No one noticed it but I was doing an invisible dance of joy.

Each suite was leased by a company for their own use or for their vip guests.
“We have 31 for lease on a long-term basis called Premier Suites and we have 10 on a per event basis called Events Suites,” Tejerero says.
The suites can go for one- to 5-year leases depending on the company and would cost about P9 million to P12 million. source

These are just some of the companies with their own suite in the Arena. Asia Brewery has one too since I saw a friend who came from there.

I managed to get pictures of an empty suite after the concert.

This was the seats next to ours. There were glass dividers in between suites.

Three lucky, lucky concert goers.

Chef Tony, may I make a request? Can you make cheese popcorn that’s not sweet? Please?

Here’s what the corporate suites look like from where I was (rooms with yellow lighting). This was as full as it got on the mosh pit.

The view from our suite was to the upper left side of the stage. When Lady Gaga stands on the right side I don’t see her. I didn’t mind since I could watch from the big screen.

I swear I saw a horse come out on stage in the opening number.

The castle opens and closes. The musicians were actually standing on the sides of the castle.

I recorded Lady Gaga’s performance of Bad Romance.

I took a break during one of the unfamiliar songs. There was a really nice bathroom inside the suite.

I spied an Illy X7.1 Iperespresso pod espresso machine and requested a decaf espresso. The wait staff in the suite were all very friendly and well trained.

These were just some of the food available in the suite.

I wish I was able to try some of the banana cream pie.

Cool ride with a keyboard!

Lady Gaga proudly introduced her guitarist who’s a Filipino. He’s the  tiny guy with black hair in the foreground.

Thank goodness she didn’t wear real meat again.

Alejandro

The encore was the popular “Edge of Glory.”

After the great concert we stayed behind and I learned a lot of trivia about the Mall of Asia Arena.

Here’s the division of seats in the Arena.

seating options in the arena

These are the retractable seats conveniently hidden.

There were approximately 12,000 seats available that night. For basketball games there will be 15,000 seats and for boxing matches there will be 17,000 seats.

When they moved the stage barrier they also swept lots of trash.

It took 12 hours to set-up the stage which was brought in via 2 747 cargo planes including all the speakers and hydraulics. It will take the hard working foreign and local crew just a few hours to disassemble the elaborate stage.

The scoreboard lowers just like in the arenas in the USA. Even the speakers were high tech!

Ample parking for 2,000 cars was just across the Arena.

Mall of Asia Arena
Sunset Avenue, Pasay City, Philippines
telephone: 831-7000 local 2939
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