Michael Jackson Memorial held at Staples Center, Los Angeles on the 7th of July 2009..

This is it!

A Michael Jackson memorial service will be held on the 7th July 2009 at Staples Center, Los Angeles.

A total of 1.6 million scrambled for the tickets..

However, many were disappointed as only 11,000 tickets were given out free to the selected lucky applicants..

The 90-minute event will be a celebration of the life of Jackson, who died on June 25 at age 50 of an apparent cardiac arrest.

Among the memorial participants will be Stevie Wonder, Mariah Carey, Usher, Lionel Richie, Kobe Bryant, Jennifer Hudson, John Mayer and Martin Luther King III.

Fans wait in line to sign a large poster of Michael Jackson at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, Monday..

About 50 theaters across the country, from Los Angeles to Topeka, Kansas, to Washington, D.C., were planning to broadcast the memorial live, for free.

A motorcade has left the home of Michael Jackson's parents, apparently heading for a private service in advance of a star-studded memorial in downtown Los Angeles.

Numerous vehicles under California Highway Patrol escort headed out from the San Fernando Valley property shortly before 8 a.m. Tuesday. The motorcade included five Rolls-Royces, three Cadillac Escalades and 10 identical black Range Rovers.

The motorcade is believed headed for Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills for a private ceremony where the body of Michael Jackson is rumoured to be laid to rest.

A freeway has been shut down amid Los Angeles' morning rush hour for the motorcade.

Los Angeles was the epicenter of Jackson-mania, but the outpouring of emotion was worldwide.

All around the world, countries are showing the event "live"..

Belgium's two national public broadcasters were to broadcast the memorial live later Tuesday and several hundred Jackson fans gathered at a Hong Kong mall late Tuesday.

Fans in Asia planned to stay up into the wee hours, bars across Europe were holding Michael Jackson theme nights and television stations from Sydney to Paris were clearing their schedules Tuesday to broadcast the King of Pop's star-studded memorial service live from Los Angeles.

In London, some fans planned to watch the event on a big screen outside the 02 Arena, where Jackson was to have performed 50 comeback shows starting next week. Others said they would watch at home after the BBC announced it would cancel scheduled programming and show the ceremony live.

Fans were gathering at Berlin's O2 World arena and at a restaurant just off Paris' Champs-Elysees, where screens were being erected and Parisians were invited to bring their own music to ensure a steady Jackson-only soundtrack for the event.

In Sweden, fans were planning candlelit gatherings in central squares in the three biggest cities: Stockholm, Goteborg and Malmo. A sports bar in Oslo, Norway was hoping to put together a special Jackson-themed menu to accompany its celebration.

Several Australian TV stations also planned to carry the event live, and the memorial was being broadcast on a giant screen in the southern city of Melbourne at 3 a.m. local time.

In Hong Kong, a suburban mall planned to tune its TV screens to the event at 1 a.m. as part of a celebration featuring performances of Jackson's signature "moonwalk" and a nonstop broadcast of his videos.

In Japan, home to some of Jackson's most passionate fans, about 100 people gathered at a Tower Records store in downtown Tokyo to watch his videos on a big screen hours before the Los Angeles memorial. The store, which Jackson visited twice, displayed his hand print in a cement block and large posters celebrating his performances. Several shelves dedicated to the pop star were stacked with his CDs and DVDs.

In the Philippines, the country's longest running noontime television variety show, "Eat Bulaga," said it would hold a Jackson dance contest Wednesday in honor of the pop icon after the Los Angeles memorial.

Even in reclusive, military-controlled Myanmar, a dance group held a memorial service for Jackson and nearly 200 fans staged a candlelight vigil in a Yangon park last week, the local Weekly Eleven News journal reported.

It has become a global event!

Jackson's fans from all over the world are definitely not going to miss this global event..

Me included..

I'm one of them who's gonna stay up to watch the "live" telecast showing on Singapore Television, Mediacorp Channel 5 at 1.30am later!!!

How I wish I was 1 of the lucky 11,000 who were selected to have the free tickets to access into the Staples Center, Los Angeles to attend Michael Jackson's memorial service..

Michael Jackson will not be buried at his beloved Neverland ranch.. Photos & Video of him rehearsing on June 23rd, hours before his death..

Michael Jackson will not be buried at his beloved Neverland ranch because his family can't obtain the paperwork required to bury a body on private property...

The singer's family were reportedly hoping to lay the star to rest at his beloved ranch but are now scrambling to find a new location amid fears it would be illegal to bury Michael at his former home.

California's health and safety laws prohibit the burying of bodies outside designated cemeteries. The family has been unable to obtain the residential exemption required to bury the star on private property.

Previous reports claimed Michael - who died last week after suffering a suspected cardiac arrest - would make his final journey from Los Angeles to Neverland today (02.07.09) in a white horse-drawn carriage.

It was claimed he would then be placed in a glass coffin so fans could pay their respects ahead of a burial on the grounds of the Santa Barbara ranch on Sunday (05.07.09).

Santa Barbara police had already been preparing crowd control and security plans for the memorial, and workmen have spent the past few days sprucing up the abandoned property.

Yesterday (01.07.09), a truck was seen delivering hundreds of portable toilets.

It is believed Michael's body is being held at Los Angeles' Forest Lawn Memorial Park in the Hollywood Hills, where his grandmother was buried in 1990.

Many believe Michael will be laid to rest there, alongside celebrities including Bette Davis, Lucille Ball, Liberace and David Carradine, who died in Thailand last month.

Insiders claim a public memorial will be held at the Staples Center sports arena in Los Angeles on Tuesday morning (07.07.09).

Unlike the planned Neverland ceremony, the body will not be present.

Michael spent the last night of his life at the Staples Center, rehearsing for his upcoming London residency until midnight on June 24.

Here's some photos (provided by AEG) of pop star Michael Jackson rehearsing at the Staples Center in Los Angeles on Tuesday, June 23, 2009...

Here's a video footage of Michael Jackson's concert rehearsal just 2 days before he died..

Click on the thumbnail below to watch his concert rehearsal video!



He's still amazing on stage at 50!

He's still the best ever..

It would have been an awesome concert performance!

Such a pity.. :_(

It's been almost a week since M.J. has left us..

Yeah.. It's been almost a week since M.J. has left us..

However, most of us still have not gotten over the fact that he's gone..

Many of his fans, including myself, are still coming to terms with his death etc..

Everyday we still see & hear news of his death via the media.. newspapers.. television & radio broadcast etc.. Speculations on what actually happened before his death.. What led to his death.. & what happened and is still happening, after his death..

Fans of his, like me, are familiar with his life story & it never fails to bring tears to our eyes to always remember all that he had went thru' in his entire life from the moment he was a child star till his recent death..

It really saddens & pains our hearts to recall all the humiliation, pain, hurts, accusations, loneliness, etc. he suffered while he was still alive..

Reports confirmed what eventually led to his death was he suffered from a cardiac arrest.

After years of suffering from ill-health.. his frail body finally succumbed to all the years of accumulated & overwhelming pressure..

News was M.J.'s health had deteriorated thru' the years due to the emotional trauma he had suffered during the 2 court cases he had to face in regards to the accusations of him molesting 2 different boys on 2 separate occasions..

Besides that, his health was further jeopardised when he had to spend the last few months, weeks & days practising for his string of up-coming concerts..

The 50-year-old singer was poised for a come-back with a string of 50 concerts scheduled to start in London on July 13.

They were to be his first concert series for 12 years and were expected to earn him more than US$400 million (S$582 million) according to concert promoters AEG Live.

He wanted to do his very best to earn not just the amount to cover up his debts & annul/nullify his bankruptcy, but to also gratify & enrapture his armies of devoted fans from all around the world..

But what was really heartbreaking news was that he mentioned he was threatened by his debtors to perform despite his deteriorating ill health or else they would have him killed!

Poor guy.. :_(

His fame came at a cost.. A lifetime of it & even to the extend of it leading to his untimely death..

He suffered physically, psychologically, emotionally.. throughout his entire life.. since he was a kid..

He really didn't deserve to suffer all that he had to..

Such an amazingly talented, child-like, gentle & mild guy like him really didn't deserve to be so nastily treated in his life..