Well I'm back at it today. Up at 4:00am for the commute into downtown Vancouver for a 6:15am shift.
After check in I head to briefing and meet up with Ed, a retired electrician from Burnaby. We've been chatting together regularly at our various posts and during our lunches. We both pick up our cards and today we are both back at Team Welcome at the Welcome Centre which we are both pretty excited about as it is warm and dry and today many of the NHL players will be arriving.
During our briefing, however, our entire Event Services Team is given some very clear and stern direction from the Supervisors. Apparently, a few athletes have left the village and sought accommodation elsewhere - Why? - because all of us folks in 'blue jackets' are too friendly!
Yes, we are too friendly, apparently as an olympic athlete you have to be very focussed 24/7 and even saying "hello" or "good morning" is too much interaction with others and very distracting therefore, by official edict, we are no longer permitted to talk with the athletes unless they engage us in conversation! Hmmm, I'm no olympic athlete but you would think that if your performance is going to be scuttled by a simple 'hello' or 'good morning' that perhaps you weren't destined for gold!
Reports from the supervisors were a little more detailed as I guess they witnessed a couple blue jacket people approaching the pro athletes for autographs and photos and apparently one even hugged Luongo which is understandably very inappropriate. From the supervisors point of view, the athletes walk from their residences to the dining hall and see about 50 people on the way to lunch and get 50 'hello's or 50 'good mornings' and that is too much.
If I'm sounding a little sarcastic that's because I am feeling a little annoyed by some of the assertions that we are all jeuvenile teenagers seeing the Jonas Brothers for the first time - we arent. Many of the volunteers are similar to myself, high functioning 'doers' in our communities who run businesses, full time volunteers etc so we all have the common sense not to act star struck when we see Sidney Crosby (whom I met today, giggle giggle, giggle).
Anyway, after we were all chastised this morning I headed to my post at the back of the Welcome Centre where all of the athletes must pass through my check point to enter the village. So I scan them and approve their accreditation and let them pass or not. Who is the first person to come through my post - Roberto Luongo. (So I jumped into his arms and hugged him with all my might - just kidding) It was a steady stream of NHLers as most finished their final NHL games on Sunday night and travelled to Vancouver overnight to check into the Village. Here's a list of who I saw just in case anyone is interested: Luongo, Getzlaf, Boyes, Selanne, Koivu, Karpa, Thorton, Pronger, Sedin x 2, a bunch of Russians whom I cant spell or pronounce, Ruutu, Weber, Toews, etc etc. My favorite was Daniel Alfredsson. I was scanning him and his joke to me was "Can you fix that thing so that the coaches dont know when we come back?" We actually chatted for a bit as he was waiting for another player to finish their accreditation.
It was a fun day at the Village over all. I was posted to the NOC entrance at 1pm and was done my shift at 2pm so I met up with Ted and Lesley who were downtown touring some more pavillions etc.
The skytrain was absolutely packed with people. At the Waterfront station it was mobs of tourists going downtown to look at the cauldron. John Furlong must have read my blog and listened to my displeasure with the 10' fence around the flame and is apparently making adjustments to the security so people can get closer and take better pics (ahh to have that kind of pull).
We headed home around 7:30 and I was beat tired. I passed out on the couch at 8:45 and went strait to bed as I have to be up again at 4am for tomorrows shift.
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