Flashback to 2002

I thought it might be amusing to post the "Dispatches from the Booth" that I kept during the Salt Lake City 2002 Olympics.

Day One

The first real day here at the Olympic Medals Plaza (OMP from now on) went on with only a few hitches. We have had a couple of test runs this past week, but a crowd of 4,000 people is quite different from a mob of 20,000! After an ordeal of trying to get from Pioneer Park, the shuttle drop-off, to the OMP and going into and then out of the Olympic Square and walking around the perimeter to get, finally, to the staff check-in, I was 30 minutes late, but learned a lot about how to arrive. The best location for the Park and Ride is the Fairgrounds - I have to drive clear to 1000 NORTH to get a ride back to the nearest entrance. Oh, brother...

In line to check in and be "intimately" probed by a cute young reservist, I heard the first hint of the bias of outsiders when I heard a lively party girl ask a young male volunteer if he wanted to to out with her later to a club, or "are you part of the local culture?" I guess that is the code phrase to identify each other.

Once I finally got in and settled at the Info Booth (hereafter IB), with my two male cohorts, I got busy and arranged our schedules and taped vital charts up on our cabinets for easy reference. I had taken several sections of the newspaper to fill in gaps, so I cut out the useful bits. The other two sat and admired each others digital cameras. This was the most helpful they were all night.
Right after the gates opened we had our first major problem. A little round lady journalist, who only spoke Russian, was handed off to us. She had come into the OMP by mistake, had her ticket ripped, and, since there is no reentry we had to figure out how to take care of getting her into the Delta Center. After a few calls to the right people, I got one of our people to walk her over to one of their people and get her in.

I had several candidates for the "What were you thinking?" award. Like the kids who came to the concert in a fleece jacket, jeans and Birkenstocks with socks, then came to us and complained that they were cold and no one was selling blankets! (BTW, it was 20º and 85% humidity - bitter) Then the older couple who came from Florida, told me they spent $10,000 on tickets and were ticked that we didn't have door to door shuttles because she had a cast on one arm and a full brace on one leg and he had diabetic neuropathy and no feeling in his feet and they didn't think they should have to walk back to the station.

LOST AND FOUND ITEM OF THE NIGHT:
A guy leaned over in the portapotty and dropped his Canon camera in. And he wanted us to call him when we sucked it out...

You may have heard about the Safe Sex kits and condom giveaway. A 20ish couple came to us and, with a straight face, wanted to know where they could get some, because they are educators and thought that it would be helpful for their students. OK.
The best thing of the night is that I went on break about 8:00, so I got to see the torch run and cauldron lighting and the first medals awarded. I was relieved and a little proud, that the crowd cheered loudly for all the winners, not just the American, and there was only a little bit of "USA, USA" chanting. And the rock and roll hooligans were actually polite, for the most part, about what was the purpose of whole thing.
On the way to the bus, I noticed a German Journalist wandering around trying to make sense of a map, so, with tons of gesturing, I got him back to the Media Center. This is when you wish you knew 7 languages.