I rubbed my eyes a couple of times to make sure I wasn’t dreaming, and even after my eyes had turned crimson red I still saw the same vision of Martina Hingis running back and forth on court 13. I was a breath away from the tennis legend, and to my surprise, I didn’t even have to queue.

I arrived in Wimbledon at about 3PM, hot and ready to queue up. Already, a short line had began to form for the overnight queue. I asked the Wimbledon stewards – they seemed to be everywhere – about what time I should queue to get a show court ticket.

“I can’t make any guarantees and it depends on the day, but I’d say you’d be fine if you join the queue at about 10PM,” one of the stewards said. I didn’t fancy sitting there for another 6 hours before setting up my tent, so I headed for the left luggage facilities, paid the surprisingly low 1 quid to the men from Securicor, and headed towards the court.

No queue! Absolutely none!! Half dazed, I walked in, passed the airport-style security, and moved towards the ticket gates. I paid my £18 for a ground court pass and suddenly, I had been thrown into my tennis theme park. Suddenly, I was standing at the very Wimbledon Lawn Tennis area I had seen in the television for 14 years.

I looked at the order of play, placed conveniently next to the ticket booths, and using my sharply honed skills of skimming and scanning, my jaws dropped when I saw that Martina Hingis was on Court 13. I would see Hingis, for £18.

I walked, nay, ran over to Court 13 all the time remembering how on one year, people actually trampled on each other while running to the courts. While running, I actually understood why people would risk their lives to get a place in their favourite court and matches.

Court 13 has a stand with several rows of seats on one side, and a smaller stand on the opposite side of the court. When I reached Court 13, a long, long queue had already formed on the larger stand. I decided to walk to the other side and a group of people were bunched together close to one end of the court. I found out that I could actually see the court and the players.

Seeing Hingis for the first time was a breathtaking experience in itself. At that stage, seeing any player at Wimbledon would have made my day, but this was Hingis, the lady who took down Graf and became a legend for so long. She was literally about 5 steps away from me, sometimes coming so close to where I was standing that I could almost hear her breathe.  And at Wimbledon, in a competitive match with Tamarine Tanasugarn’s doubles partner, Aiko Nakamura.

It took Hingis a while to dispose of Nakamura, who was throwing errors for fun. I must have taken a hundred pictures and really couldn’t concentrate on the match. I was too excited for that. When Hingis left the court, Ljubicic was due on. I saw him play a few games before the dreaded rain came on.

The rain persisted for the next couple of hours, but I just sat there, absorbing the Wimbledon atmosphere and watching the ballboys second guess the weather. Covers off, covers on, covers off covers on. I watched the canopy get blown up with air to protect the lawn courts from the rain. I was at Wimbledon and I didn’t care if it rained.

Shortly, there was an announcement that play had been cancelled for the day. I headed back to the left luggage facility, collected my tent and luggage, and headed for the overnight queue. My fear of the night ahead was mixed with excitement. This was going to be the full Wimbledon experience, one you just can’t buy.