Red Mittens - Vancouver 2010

P.O.D.

2010-03-04T14:21:00.000-08:00

Post Olympic Depression

Sounds familiar to you? I'm sure from everybody who was in Vancouver to work for the Games are in on it. It's probably even worse living in Vancouver and feeling it. Even people across the country are probably feeling it.

I'm used to it - Everytime I finish one of my academic competitions, I have that post 'Jeux du Commerce' Depression that students across Québec feel as well - it's a competition that you prepare for almost a year beforehand and it's done, Poof!, within 4 days. And I've been going through that three times a year with Happening Marketing and HR Symposium throughout the year. Olympics, I've applied about 2 years ago, and after 3 weeks and a half, Poof!, it's gone. And it won't come back. As for JDC, I will be participating again next year, where they will be held in Ottawa. Heck, I even have Happening Marketing coming up at the end of March to look forward to - making this Post-Olympics depression easier on me, I believe.

I haven't been able to go back to work yet - Tomorrow is the big day. I'm seriously scared of going back, thinking I may have lost knowledge with my month of thinking only of which section the bathrooms are located, where the smoking section is (Gate 3 - Section 109), infobooth (Section 311 and 114), where the ATM is (Section 116), where the elevators are (you can't go to the north ones in Section 308, but you must go to the ones at 319), Which sections you can't access and have to do the loop (Sorry, sections 105 to 101, sucks to be you, you can proceed to bitch at me now), how to get to Beatie street, Georgia, Granville and where the Olympic superstore is, how to access the SkyTrain the fastest from the arena and lastly hear compliments about my eyes pretty much constantly - which was nice from all the repetitive questions. But, I unfortunately will not be getting anymore questions about the Sections, or any compliments, but more about ''Gen, can you do this T1 for me before the end of the day? Thanks'' and me calling the government ''Hi, I need information about a client of ours, I'm calling from BDO Canada and my name is Genevieve, and the client's SIN # is _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _''. Although, don't get me wrong, I do love my job and the people! : )

So yes, I would take knowing a few sections by heart over doing 1o personal tax returns in a day, or even a gigantic one within 4 days (Thanks, person who put all their year's receipt in a shoe-box, you really thought you were getting away with it!)

But that's the reality. I'm back in Ottawa. I'm on my couch. About to go downtown with my blue coat (Yeah, kind of excites me) but it's the harsh reality of not going out to Granville tonight, or not attending a free concert at Granville Island or LiveCity either, not using my Volunteer accreditation & blue jacket for freeloading off stuff, or passing as a ''staff worker'' to get in somewhere, not singing Oh Canada on the Skytrain, not high-fiving tons of strangers on the street, not being asked questions from strangers about anything and everything in Vancouver when I'm in the streets with the blue jacket, even if I have no idea the answer (I guess I won't worry about that in Ottawa wearing the blue coat), of eating Pizza every second day because you have no car, and honestly, it's the easiest thing to split with your brother, to sit in the volunteer debrief room every morning with tons of strangers but who eventually became familiar faces and even some, very good friends, to go out every night and end up with some friendly strangers after the bar taking part in the most silliest things in the streets - mostly some screaming and cheering for Canada, to have about 15 new contacts in my phone - close to non with a last name and who will remain as those random friends I made in Vancouver, to buy expensive beer in Vancouver - whether it was at the bar (7 - 9$ each) or at the Liquor store (30$ for 12), to watch the fireworks and the fire shows at Robson Square that goes on each night to just working my shifts everyday - making friends with everybody in my section at the Hockey Games and seeing people so excited about hockey and the Olympics, I will really miss it.

And I'm not alone.

Some people are calling it post-podium depression. Which where they write why they think people are having this depression: Why is the sense of loss so profound in Vancouver? I think, in part, it's because the whole thing turned out far better than anyone expected.
Which I think is completely true. I was doubting the whole experience my first week. But now I'm embracing it. I've never seen such patriotism outside of Ottawa on Canada Day ever - and I think it even surpassed it!

Over here, they mention: You eat dinner with it, you spend the night with it, you fall asleep in front of it. For the better part of a fortnight, you come to count on it, put your trust in it.
This seriously represents what I've been doing the past 3 weeks, when I would get home from volunteering (if that) I would turn on the TV, write my blog, then go to bed, with the TV on sleep for 30 minutes with CTV on. Never did I watch anything else if I had the chance.

And CTV is calling it the post-Olympic blues. Some people comparing it to after Christmas.

Well, like I said, it can't be that bad. I do have parties lined up with friends this weekend and it'll make me remember why I love them so much and kind of started missing them by the end of my trip. Kinda guys.

Well, tomorrow I'm going back to work. Wish me luck!

ONT vs BC

2010-03-04T13:01:00.003-08:00

Now before I write my final words on the Olympics and perhaps not touch my blog for a while, I wanted to point out something just as experiencing BC / Vancouver, but for more than a week or a weekend. I basically became a resident of Surrey travelling to BC every single day.

Now I know we are Canada, but wow are we ever different from End to End, East to West and I’m sure South to North as well! But there are also similarities.

1) The culture clearly differs. As we can see in Ottawa, we are very multicultural as well but it’s completely different in terms of nationalities.

2) The Public Transportation. In Ottawa, I used to say the occasional thank you to the bus driver as I stepped out of the front door. In Vancouver, people scream Thank you from the back door, almost all the time! Also, they have their bus stops electronically up so if you’re from out of town, it’s easy to find where you are going. Downside of Vancouver: Some of their bus stops don’t have numbers or anything.

3) The Streets. At first, I thought it was CRAZY to name all the streets ‘164^th avenue’ and ‘130^th street’. What? Were these people reall non-creative? No. They were smart. They do this so people can situate themselves really easily, and people knew exactly which area of Surrey you were in when I would tell them.

4) The bad ‘neighbourhoods’. You know when you live in Vanier, and you’re sorta embaressed so say ‘vanier’ while looking around a bit knowing that they might make fun of you, I realized where I was, Surrey, was the same thing! By the end of my stay, I would say Surrey while looking around and a bit rolling my eyes, becauses of the reactions I had gotten from people the whole week! Same same thing as Vanier or any other rough neighbourhoods.

5) The Rain. People in BC are not phased at all by the rain, and will go out and do their regular thing as us in Ottawa seem to curl up in a ball and try to avoid anything that has to do with going outside.

6) The Weather. Clearly, it was hot as hell over there. But I heard that had their warmest winter, but I think it’s usually along the same lines.

7) The public transportation part 2 – The skytrain was very similar to the 95 in terms of people busting out the Oh Canada, but it was much more efficiently run.

8) The French. They don’t give a shit! They either really don’t care, or hate it even. People were frustrated that it was at every Olympic venue in both official languages. Yeah sure, there wasn’t that many Québec people and the French from France were probably pretty happy, but at least we’re not in the States where they only have one language, and doesn’t say much about their culture and one-mindedness? It was funny, because at the GM Place they would annonce certain things in French first (i.e. a newly acquired gold medal) and I would cheer … but nobody else, until they heard it in english. Pff. I did have a few talks with anglophones in Vancouer that did realize that problem and were loving to hear my opinion on it. Kudos to you guys. It’s funny because in Ottawa, the anglophones totally respect french and even in circumstances would wish that they spoke it! Complete different end of the spectrum. People also were really amazed at how well I could speak english, some not even realizing I was french (whooaa!) but nobody even ever assumed we were franco-ontarians, just Québec right away. Except some Québecers, they would be the ones to point out our ontario out of us!

9) The Alcohol. 30$ for a 12 of beer? Are you kidding me? For some reason in BC, their beer is really expensive. Hard alcohol is a bit more expensive, but wow. And it’s funny because you have the BC Liquor Store and privately owned Liquor Stores offering Beer and Wine as well. Clearly different than Ontario (Hard alcohol only dealt by the Ontario Government) and slightly different than Québec.

I’m sure I’ll think of more, later on. But there’s one thing that’s definitely the same: It’s the way we act for our Hockey Teams. The guys cheer the same way, people are just as crazy about hockey in Vancouver as it is in Ottawa or Montreal. I thought it was really cool to see that the atmostphere in a bar did not differ at all on a hockey night whether you are in the East of the West. Go Canada Go!

Also, all the Vancouverites are all having high hopes of the Stanley Cup now. I guess they see a direct correlation on the Gold from the Olympics and the Stanley Cup, but I feel like they are only setting themselves up for dissapointment, because let’s be honest, it is really hard to win the Stanley Cup. But I’ll be honest – it probably won’t be the Habs going to the finals, so all the power to them and to believe!

Monday - March 1st - Whistler

2010-03-03T12:58:00.001-08:00

So we got into Whistler at about 7:45 am and then dragged all of our luggage to the Hotel we rented last minute - 150$ with tax and everything. It was really not bad, especially we met up with people who booked a room a while back and paid 298$/per night for just a really small room. It was perfect for my brother and I. So we get dressed and head for the slopes.

What an amazing day - I will have more pictures when my brother's camera gets back - but we did start out wiht a breakfast up top after a few runs, which was pretty amazing view. We heard about these free mountain tours - which we assumed it'd be older people giving us the tour - but went with it anyway. So we did that at 11:30 (oh and after doing a Boarder Cross run - it's so fun, I definitely would want to do that! hhehe) And they brought us all the way up in the Bowls. Now, I have never seen so much snow and openness. That's the thing, it's SO open I can't believe it.

We did one of the bigger and popular bowls where we had to hike up after a T-Bar (oh, I am no longer afraid of them) and so I have a pretty cool video of that. Steph hiked up a bit to get really fresh Pow and it was pretty cool. We would stop a bit everywhere and they would explain where all the other Bowls were, where you had to hike to get to the more intense ones, and wow everything seemed really amazing. It's such a free-for-all!

We took the Peak-To-Peak at the end of the day to check it out, and skied on Whistler at the end of the day. We were dead tired by 3 pm so decided to call it a day. Although it took us quite a while to get all the way down, where the snow was getting very much like April-like snow. Kinda sucks, there was 0 snow in the village or anywhere around, kind of weird to experience!

At night we met these 2 groups in the hottub, and one of them were from Hull. We went to supper with them, then hit up Tommy's Africa for the 80's night. Everybody was fully dressed up for it - reminded me of JDC parties - but they were all SUPER snobby. I was really turned off by the ''locals'' attitude - like they were the cool kids in High School but I felt like they were all like.. dumb as shit.. No offense. It wasn't like JDC at all because I felt like the people were missing just, brains. I don't mean to be harsh towards the locals, but I realized that they all either serve, work in hotels, etc which yeah it is a sweet life, and I'd love to get a transfer of BDO there, but I started doubting them!

gay pride week at Whistler

Anyway, we went back, I woke up at 8:30 am to catch a bus to the airport, caught my plane at 2:30 and only got in Ottawa at 1 am.

Going over the Rockies in the Plane.

That was it! I'll keep posting a bit because I really want to make a post with all the main differences between BC and Ontario.

I'm back home now if you want to hang out! Haha!

Sunday - February 28th - Crosby SCORES!!!

2010-03-03T12:47:00.000-08:00

So today, we go straight from where we were last night because we ended up staying up until 7 am and just passing out until 10 am - They were pretty nice and didn't mind letting us crash on the couch. We get to the Canada Hockey Place where Steph was able to sneak his way in by completely lying to everyone (Haha Just for you) and sat beside a camera, on a media box that they set up for those cameras, for the whole game. I, didn't have my pass back on time, and couldn't do the plan I had planned! Nooooo - I know, it was harsh. But I just went across the street to the Molson Canadian Hockey House - but from the outside and met up with Judy, the girl that I spend watching the Swiss game with. She was there with her RCMP cousin so the three of us caught the game together.

It was a wild game - I don't have to go into details. I can tell you when Parise scored, the whole crowd went dead silent from cheering (since they were cheering loud from about 2 minutes left). I immediately saw downtown Vancouver all in fire from a riot I could see being caused if Canada would lose - and would ruin the whole feel-good image that the Olympics were getting in the past week. So I was really hoping for the sake of the Olympics, that wouldn't happen.

The entrance to the house.

It was 100$ to 200$ for a Day Pass at the Hockey House, and people were even scalping passes as well.

Anyway, when we scored, everybody went nuts naturally. The party immediately started, and I'm sure it was the exact same in Ottawa - like people wrote on facebook, a mini-Canada Day/Sens Mile. I thought the same thing, but it was already like that each and every night, and even more on any Team Canada win nights.

Unfortunately, my brother and I were absolutely dead from the night before so we had to skip the whole downtown thing (we had done it about 9-10 times anyway) and head home to go pack because we had a 5:15 am train to take. We ended up going home and sleeping for a while, then taking a cab at 3 am to get downtown in time. It was a weird night. And we missed out - but hey, it's stuff like that you have to do if you want to go to WHISTLER!

Saturday - February 27th - Alberta House

2010-03-03T12:40:00.000-08:00

So today we got up a bit late and I was quite hungover, and decided to contact Jean-Marc (our new Montreal friend) and Elodie to go out and enjoy our real last night in Vancouver.

So we did just that by meeting up at the Edgewater Casino, headed to McDonald's while Jean-Marc got tons of Free stuff at the Ahtlete Village (Oh and his Federov pass-hilarious), bought out Greyhound tickets for Whistler and then headed towards Granville once again. It was raining, but something was hilarious - There was TONS of people partying, and that's pretty standart here, but they were all in their MOST ridiculous outfits and the oldest boombox - blaring out a radio station all at the same time. So there's about 100 people with boomboxes, and people will signs of a Decentralized Dance Party. It was a lot of fun to see. Clearly, I lost the crew and went filming all of this.

This guy was crazy on the guitar. Reminded me of a Guitar Hero character!

So we proceeded through Granville trying to figure out where we could go out - We knew that everywhere would be packed so I mentioned the bar I was at the night before - there was a DJ and a small dance area, decent prized alcohol compared to everywhere else, so let's do it. On the way there, we bump into the Alberta House and there was a good song playing so we decided to go in there instead.

The DJ was okay - I mean, he could of been playing better music at first. The house basically closes at midnight, so towards the end he started playing all the classics (some on a remix) of the country songs.

We met these young 'kids' I'll call them in line, they were 18, when we were coming in and had a few drinks wiht them, started a dancing circle and we were just crazy in general. Trying to have a good time, there was a few people cheering for Finland (They had just won the bronze) and a few ''cowboys''. I met these 2 boys that paid 3,000$ for their tickets to the final, which was pretty standard at this point! But wow. I didn't think it was worth that much - but yet again, we heard somebody paid 100,000$ for 4 tickets together in the 100's the day of. That is nuts my friends! Or maybe I'm too used to seeing tons of games, all the time...

Then we left a bit before 12 to go to the next bar, just around the corner, called Dix. It was a peanut bar, with peanuts absolutely everywhere, and drinks were definitely decently priced as we've been paying 7-9$ beers all month. Yeah, it's expensive, that's why we snuck in a lot of alcohol.

Skip to the last call, we start drinking our last pitcher really fast, then these guys are playing some sort of beer pong, on a pool table, but like, you get a peanut in somebody's glass and they have to drink, it's a big free for all. Before that, we start throwing them peanuts kind of causing a peanut-food-fight until they tell us to come join them to finish up their pitchers too.

This is pretty much what it looks like.

After that, we start walking outside with them to where they invite us to come over and keep on partying. As we're a bit tipsy, the four of us just say Yes to continue the party and go over to their house. It ended up being one of the most fun we've had - the girl had a bass violin (I'm not even sure if that's what it's called, it was just a gigantic violin a size of a person), one of the guys had a guitar, tam tam's and randomnly this other european looking guy brought out an accordion - which he was AMAZING at! So they jammed for quite a while and it was really nice to hear. At one point, the accordion guy just started signing really loud! It was really godo though, I got it on tape. You'll definitely see it in the video.

So that's about it for that day! We're a bit anxious to find out about tomorrow's game..

Friday - February 26

2010-03-03T12:17:00.000-08:00

I wrote this in Word and never got a chance to get it out for some reason. Yesterday = Friday.

So basically yesterday was pretty crazy and a scratch-off. First, I got to watch the semi-finals from a ridiculously good view, Section 111 to be precise, and so I didn’t take any breaks to eat or anything because no way I was missing that. I did get the end on video by a friend of mine, so that will be precious to keep! (My parents even spotted me on TV when I went all the way down the stairs to check something out)

People started chanting ‘We want USA’ very early before the game was over – which at one point I didn’t think it was going ot be a 3-2 game. After a while, I told the people waiting to go to their seats that I thought it was a tad too early to say that (about 10 minutes before the 3^rd period) and I think they got mad at me because Slovakia scored right after that. Oops.

I wish I could of taped the people walking out of the stadium. The usual – Oh Canada, We want USA, We want Gold (yeah no pressure boys) and Go Canada Go and so on. But it’s just magical in there, when there’s a goal, it’s so crazy. I really hope we don’t lose – it would just put the whole nation on a year-long depression and the media would dissect every single thing that happened.

I met up afterwards with Scott, a guy who works for the New Jersey Devil which I couldn’t get over the fact he was a ‘jersey’ boy but actually made sense about hockey. Ha ha. Then we went to this bar with two of his friends who get to ‘work up’ the crowd – sweet job if you ask me – and basically just decided to party the night away, it was another of those random but great nights.

Big flag in bar

New Jersey hat - don't get fooled, its still Go Habs Go

Tonight I’m going downtown with Steph and we’re just going to go out and enjoy the last few days we have here in Vancouver. We jut own our 13^th gold – tieing the Soviets for their All-Time record and that means that tomorrow we’ll BEAT it – Right boys?

I also got a cowbell donated to me last night and it made me really happy for some reason. I love how they represent the hockey moms everywhere across Canada – You know you had somebody’s mom on your hockey team that had a cowbell, usually just one person, but we all know it! Hehe

Ottawa

2010-03-02T23:34:00.000-08:00

I've just landed in Ottawa - It's been a great journey.

Update tomorrow on what I've done since Friday and until today. Whistler included!

For now, here is a video of Marianne St-Gelais watching her boyfriend Charles Hamelin win his gold. So cute, made me cry. But yet again, it's 2:33 am in Ottawa and I'm exhausted and about to go to bed.

Ahhh I'll miss these Olympics so much.

As if it's over!

2010-02-28T22:54:00.001-08:00

We pretty much busted the internet limit where we are staying so I'll just have to be brief.

Full descriptions will be coming up very soon; basically friday and saturday nights were both drink-till-7am and the most random things has happened.

Didn't get a chance to catch the gold medal game, my plan failed! Gah!

Tomorrow I'm going to Whistler. We're actually taking a cab at 3 am to get to the bus terminals, to then take an hour long bus to the Train station, where we are taking the 5:15 am bus to Whistler to get us there at 7:45 am. We then will go check at our hotel see if we can check in, if not just leave our baggage there. We have a hottub and we'll be right in the centre of the village. Then I take a bus back around 10 am Tuesday morning to go back to Vancouver and straigh to the Airport.

I can't believe it's almost all over :( Although tomorrow will be epic.

I'm going to wear my Team Canada jersey on and I'm trying to find a flag to put somewhere on my snowpants. We're also going to snowboard with our volunteer coats, haha.

I can't wait to go! Wow! It's 11 pm so I'm leaving in 4 hours, so weird!

That's it for now! Lots of pics to come, and I took amazing videos!

OT: Women are dominating the podium for Canada

2010-02-25T18:18:00.000-08:00

I just wanted to bring to your attention how the Canadian women are really rocking the podium right now. We have 6/8 golds from women, and they account 80% of the total medal count.

I think this is amazing, being involved as a girl in sports as I always did as a kid. I think our programs are really equal promoting sports to both genders. It does suck that it's a bit bittersweet to win gold for Hockey as we were the heavily favored to win at least a silver in this sport, but must feel really good for those ladies. For me in ringette, it was like the day Gloucester beat Ottawa in 2006 to go to Nationals, I'll always remember that time.

On that note, we have just beaten Canada's record for Gold Medals - putting our count at 8. Now, the country is in the running for the most gold medals at these Winter Games, which I think would take the pressure off the Own the Podium program people have been fussing about. I don't think without that program we would have half of these medals, and we only got unfortunate with the 18 4th and 5th place finishes.

We have tons of great chances of getting more golds, included women's curling, men's curling, men's hockey which I cannot wait to see the final outcome, hopefully in a box suite as I was explaining earlier (Yeah, I'm not going to work, sorry work ethics, you will take the side while I spoil myself with this olympic experience)

On that note, I want to point out how JDC and the Olympics are so similar (Tom Horvath would gladly explain that to anybody) and as newly appointed coordinator for next year's JDC, how I am STOKED to be able to be part of the Ottawa 2011 delegation for the JDC 2011, held in Ottawa. Also, our committee consists of 80% of females (what, you're surprised?) so I'm sure we'll do just as well as Canada's girls!

Day 13: Ok, Somebody ate their breakfast this morning!

2010-02-25T13:49:00.000-08:00

And by that, I meant the whole hockey team. I'm not sure if it was Canada who decided to just start speeding everything up and play their real game, or if it's the Russia that had so many nerves that they seemed to not even know what hockey was in the first period....

So because I worked outside the day before, they named all of us and we were going to be put inside. I thought that'd be great, but I had to split ticket-taking duty at the door and being an usher in the 100's. Also, that section is the smoker's section. You get like the crazy-smokers absolutely wanting their smoke but you have to stamp them, etc, it gets a bit crazy. I got to watch most of the 2nd period, could of watched the third but the game was pretty much already done! So I decided to go eat.

I'm not sure if it's because 75% of the people there are men ranging from 25 - 35 years old, drunk with their buddies ready to spend all their cash on beers, and the fact that there's only about 3% of volunteers there that are girls that are younger like me, but I've been getting hit on working at the GM Place on a daily basis. It's ridiculous! All the time! The guys always try to hug me, take pictures with me, flirt with me, say all these things, I always find it really funny in the end, as I said, pretty sure there's not many younger volunteers, it's all older anal women I would say, I'm clearly the coolest one. Yet, still do my job.

So it was pretty crazy in the rink at first! SO loud! Also, doing the tickets before the Canada Game also made me see some people that couldn't get in because well they basically got effed by the scalpers. Sucks to be them. The thing with the scanners. is that once you've scanned it, you can't re-enter with it. That's why we have to personally stamp them to make sure nobody gets through the cracks. There was a few people that came thinking that was their game, but they had the worng time :( But we ended up giving them tickets anyway because well it really sucks to reject those honest people.

I videotaped the crazyness from I get off the skytrain as I walk through my shift, but also took a few pictures. I also saw Miga and Squatchi, and went paparazzi crazy on them which I'm sure they weren't amused because we were in a accrediated people-only area. The people screaming and cheering the whole way up to the venu was so crazy! Can't wait to see more of it!

I was burnt afterwards so just went back home. These standing days are getting long! Also, I met Jean Maisonneuve my old boss at BDO who has a Suite basically for every game. He told me for the Finals I can come and see him and stay in the Suite. You know what that means! I'll come in with my volunteer outfit because I'm supposed to work at 12 for the ceremonies (no way I'm going!) and then I'll just make my way onto the Suites, ask to go see a friend of mine, get chanced once in there at the bathrooms, and BAM! I'm in! So hopefully that will work! Wouldn't it be crazy to see this! Not working too, it's hard to contain emotions sometimes!

That's it for now! Tonight I'm off so I'm planning on going out and seeing stuff!

Here are some pics of people walking out - people were going nuts! And at that same time, we were catching the bobsleigh and announced to everybody about the gold and silver and people went nuts!

Also, these guys (well like, old men) invented a new sport. Don't remember what they call it, something with snowballs. So walking back home I got a picture with them!

I decided to put on my best tourist impression

Day 12

2010-02-24T01:17:00.000-08:00

I got to work outside today - it really wasn't pleasant with all the cold! Brrrr! Rain and wind are not a good combo, with the cold. It gets you straight to the bone! Such a weird cold, different than out East for sure.

Again, my days have been a bit more relax due to the nature of my shifts. (4pm -12 am)

I just wanted to say:

GO CANADA GO!

Four years ago, was a different team, different town. This is ours!

So Let's show Russia where we are, and it's Canada, and it's our gold medal!

Hopefully I'll be inside, if so, check out my TwitPics for the live picture updates!
I'm also secretly hoping for the Swiss to pull an upset on USA! Come on!!
It is sad that one of the teams (Canada or Russia) will not even get a medal, especially after a seeding of 2 and 1 respectively. It's clear Finland, Sweden or the Czechs are not better teams than this, on paper.
My guesses for the semi-finals: Hopefully Canada vs Sweden and USA vs Czech. I have a feeling Czech will come on top for some reason.

After coming across this article, I realized that I was about 1 meter away from Tretiak, an Russian legend for his goaltending, on my second shift. Random, I know.

That's it for now, my brother is out at the casino playing with some drunken fully-loaded scalpers taking all their money, so good for him! I was just too cold to even move, I really had to come straight here.

I also wanted to direct you to this picture which I find really arrogant of the Russian figure skater. (It is the shot you get when you enter his website) Also after seeing he did this to young girls.

Day 11

2010-02-22T23:27:00.000-08:00

I can't even write a title for today because there wasn't much exciting today.

It's a bit weird to be here without pictures, or videos of my day, because I basically went to work from 2 - 9 and came back home afterwards.

I didn't usher today - I was at the media/olympic family accreditation check outside, so making sure the people could get in there with the right card. I would scan their cards, and they would either get a random check or go through. I saw a lot of interesting titles, a lot of the board of administrators and the executive olympic committee, 2012 London observers (this is for you Liane!) as well as athletes, and the two biggest recognizable names would be Kevin Lowe and Donald Sutherland. It was refreshing to be outside as I didn't even want to be inside watching the women's hockey since I kind of have a hard time watching it.

As the Toronto Sun puts it, the women's hockey is:

''Team Canada will play Team USA for the gold medal in women’s hockey in the least competitive, least interesting, least Olympic of all sports in the Winter Games.''
''Fourteen wasted games of the supposed Olympic hockey tournament has produced nothing more than something all of us have known for years. There is no other sport like this in the Summer or Winter Games. Nor should there be."
''Truth is, you or I could play goal for Canada or the U.S. and get the team to the gold-medal game. And I know I’m not much of a goalie.''

Funny, as maybe you would think I would be somebody to encourage women's hockey as a ringette/hockey player myself, but I think it's only embarrassing. They might as well make a best 3 out of 5 tournament for USA vs Canada in the hockey division and Finland vs Canada in the ringette division to give something to the public, and not embarrass the Olympics. I mean, I could easily be playing for any of those foreign countries and probably do just as well. Gah, frustrating!

We are being silly at the curling rinks, and I absolutely love it! The fans are being crazy - hockey fans styles - something the sport has yet seen. Even the Québec boys I met the other night went to a curling game cheering for something they don't even know much about! It's funny because articles about this as I referred earlier, were talking about how this would happen.

Tomorrow and Wednesday, I'll be working 4:30 - 12:00 so that will be quite a shift. It's better than my 9-5 because if I get to usher, I will be able to catch both of the last games, and only seat one group (the 9 pm) instead of seating 2 groups and only watching one game.

I met another couple on the bus on the way back home, very nice people, hopefully they catch my blog by now!

Okay, that is it for now. It might not be too exciting for a while because of my late-night shifts and I don't think I'll be going around town during the day. Thursday, I'm going to hit the Holland Heinken House for the day/women's finals/night with my friend Alex and his buddies from Ottawa.

Just today, I kind of missed Ottawa for some reason. Kinda!

Congrats to our golden couple, Moir and Virtue, to make figure skating look cool, even to guys! They are from Ontario, and been skating together since they were 7 years old! Wow!

The Men's hockey last night, Canada vs USA has broken records about the most watched sports program watched ever, with some 10 million watching it. That means every 3rd person in Canada were watching it!

Good night!

Day 10: Cowboys Fringants

2010-02-22T11:23:00.002-08:00

Well, yesterday was pretty slow. I woke up not feeling the best and realized the buses are not passing for a while because of the Sunday schedule so I would of been majorly late. I also realized that the chances of me sneaking in after my shift were getting slimmer by the day, and the attendance was much higher yesterday for the CAN vs USA game, meaning that scalpers were really able to sell off all of their tickets.

I met up with Marco, a friend from Louis-Riel along with his other friend Dominique and then 2 other people they knew from Victoria. Around 3 pm, we walked to the Granville Island to get comfortable in a bar but clearly we were still too late.

We ended up catching the first period at Bar l'Adrénaline and then the 2nd and the 3rd on the big screen at the main stage.

After becoming depressed alongside the 33 million people in Canada, we decided to fix this by getting drunk! Yay! It's funny because the announcer said something like this: Comme canadiens français on est bon a célébrer des victoires, mais on est également bon à célébrer des défaites!

Anyway, so off to the Granville Island Brewery we go:

We got the tasters, but ended up chugging most of them when we were strapped for time to go back and catch Cowboy Fringants. Here's a few other pictures:

Walking there was quite the funny part, since we were feeling the beers quite well. After that, les Cowboys had already started and we were basically front row the whole concert.

It was a pretty energetic concert, and I definitely forgot temporarily about the hockey loss.

After that, I saw the Québec guys I had met the night before, and we just chilled for a bit before going home pretty early because the band playing at Adrénaline was really... hm... special? I guess that's the word. So I went all the way back to Surrey, falling asleep a bit everyone on each train I was taking.

Now let's talk hockey.

If you want to know more about what will happen, You can check out the wikipedia site right here. Basically, tomorrow Canada will be playing Germany to qualify for the Quarters (I will be working at this time exactly) and then Wednesday all the quarter finals are playing (So I assume Canada should win against Germany and they will play Russia)

If they win that game, which I'm sure right now, according to my Dad, they will definitely not even make it to the finals, they will play, most likely against Sweden or Slovakia in the semi-finals. Now, let's say they win that, it's a toss-up who they would play afterwards but it'll be a toss-up between USA, Finland or Czech.

We can all see how this differs alot from what we had imagined, but hey! I'm sure Russia isn't thrilled that they'll have to face Canada in quarters. Basically, all the big contenders like Russia, Canada and Sweden will all have to be eliminated before the finals, whereas USA now is a favorite to get to finals because of the weaker contenders.

Now onto the goalies: Yes Brodeur was very weak yesterday, and I'll safely assume Luongo will start against Germany to get him warmed up for the Russia game. I WILL be working during the Russia v Canada game, so I'll make sure to find myself a job that requires me watching it! Miller was really into it yesterday and was basically a wall, while Brodeur definitely let a few by him that usually wouldn't of happened. Now USA has this ridiculous confidence that we gave them, and they are talking about Miracle on Ice again from how many years ago, ugh!

Anyway! Today I have a shift from 2-9 pm and it's the women's semi-finals, I think I will voluntarily take a shift outside, as it almost frustrates me to watch the women play!

To finish, here are more fantastic High-def pictures HERE.

Here is a cute commercial about moms:

Day 9: Gala Juste Pour Rire

2010-02-21T12:38:00.001-08:00

Well! Here I am, I was supposed to work today but I wasn't feeling good / wanted to catch the game from a bar for once (and wear a team canada jersey and not the blue coat!) so I decided to call in ''sick''. Therefore, I won't be sneaking into the 100's for the Canada game, but I think I've had my fair share of excitingness for free already!

On to last night, I had it off, and we went to the Gala Juste Pour Rire and there were TONS of good comedians, it was really hilarious. They delivered exactly what I was hoping - Olympic jokes alongside with everything else in life. Louis José Houde really got me and my brother when he did an elaborate set about a tent-trailers and talking about going up camping with his family. We could SO relate, I can't wait to show the footage to you (Mom and Dad) because it will seriously crack you guys up!

I met up with Alex Gibson a friend of mine from B-D back in the day, and also met up with Audrée, my cousin's girlfriend as well as Marc from the other night. It was really fun to just be a bunch of people randomly together, and these are not even people that I hang out one a regular basis, you know? It's all in the Olympic magic!

The pictures are a bit blurry but that's the best I could do. I do have a lot of footage so I'll be able to compile a bit of that!

Afterwards, we headed, as per usual, to Club Adrénaline to party a bit more. We met some Québecers in line; they had been saving up for 4 years each putting money aside to finally come here and basically blow it all here! Haha! They were from Trois-Rivieres I think, and a bit older than me but around my brother's age. They were pretty cool, I ended up staying with them for a while. Also I met this couple from Newfoundland that I ended up dancing on stage with! It was quite a fun night, although Steph was pretty beat and sat down a lot of the night, garding my coat hehe!

It was a DJ playing only francophone party songs, so it was pretty cool to hear that. From the good beats of today to the Ce soir on danse classics, it was a fun night. Over there it's always fun, and there's mostly older people, so it's easy to spot the younger ones and basically come together, you know!

Also the guys had made this flag that they'll be bringing to the game tonight:

One of their moms were nice enough to cut the two flags and put them back together. So Let me know if you see this on TV! They were supposed to contact me at the game because I was supposed to be there, but I'll assume they'll go back to Granville Island again because of les Cowboys Fringants performing!

This will be rather interesting as I 100% plan on showing up with the Team Canada jersey one of the guys gave me at the first Canada games and they are well, des séparatistes! We'll see what they will say about Canada tonight! In the Olympic spirit and all!...

La dernière fois que je les ais vu, j'étais en première année pendant Frosh Week a l'Université d'Ottawa mais je connaissait pas autant leurs chansons, maintenant je peux dire que je connais très bien la plupart des chansons donc j'ai hâte de me rendre en avant pour partyer avec les Québécois!

C'est drôle à cause à la Place de la Francophonie je me sens tellement plus à l'aise, ''à la maison''. C'est vraiment plaisant!

And yes if you are wondering, I'm pretty much always having the time of my life, meeting a new group of people every night is pretty much the best thing ever for me.

It's a big hockey game so make sure to watch!

Day 8: DEADMAU5!

2010-02-20T14:21:00.002-08:00

Well, here is to another day and night in the sea of Red aka Canaday Day every day.

I worked usher again but yesterday was particularly boring hockey games that I saw. Actually the Sweden game as pretty good at the end, I was just really tired. It's hard to stay standing up all day. I know it doesn't sound so bad, but doing nothing standing up is really hard, 8 days in a row!

After work, I met up with Brendan, a volunteer at the Infobooth who currently goes to UBC and is a year younger than me, also looks like 5 years older than me and is 6'5 or something! So we heard during the day that the lineup for Deadmau5 was ridiculous, and that nobody could even get in anymore. And we definitely got the proof of that when we got there and the lineup was probably the biggest I have ever seen in my life for a free concert outside.

For those who don't know Deadmau5 (pronounced Dead Mouse), he's a Canadian Electro DJ from Toronto that's been really popular in the last year. His most popular song, Ghosts n Stuff, has been around for a while now and you might know it by now.

So when we get there, we ask the security guy about how to get in and the time for the line, then he redirects us to the Staff entrance. So we decide that we have nothing to lose trying to go through the staff entrance. (We gave ourselves a 5% chance) So we just non-chalantly go into the staff entrance, put our stuff through the airport security screening once again, and just WALK IN! This was ridiculous, as the people had been waiting all day to get in there, and they closed the doors at 4 pm; while still people waiting in line in hopes to get in. Here is a Vancouver Sun article that can explain more how crazy it was (20,000 tried to get into a 8,000 people venue)

Just outside the entrance

So I call Steph to tell him to get over here and pass through the staff entrance as a volunteer who works there. The worst is that our pass looks nothing like the pass they have at LiveCity (they are hosted by the City, not VANOC) and our coats are definitely a different blue. I was saying how they were the leftover volunteers that got the leftover jobs ha ha! Anyway, we were pretty pumped, and we were in at 5:30 leaving us time to do the pavilions in there.

So we did the Coke pavilion, and it was pretty cool:

Torches for the past olympics

With a Torch!

The pavilion was really cool in the end. You could do some interactive games, and the people working there were the most energetic I've seen in any pavilions.

Then we also did the ACER, Samsung and Panasonic pavilions which all had some really cool tech things we could see.

Each pavilion had their own cool thing: The Panasonic 3D HD theatre showed the 2008 and 2010 Olympics in full real 3D, for the opening ceremonies and the sports. It was funny because we had seen the opening ceremonies live, and it looked exactly the same. Also, they shot in 3D at the Norway - Canada game, and I saw myself on the 3D Theatre about 3-4 times because I was in the corner behind the goalie! Clearly, I was really excited, but nobody else cared haha!

At the samsung one, they had a bunch of interactive touch screens and cool stuff to do with cell phones, and the ACER one had the Olympic video game on the computer, which you would be doing the real courses of the Vancouver olympics, and the graphics were just amazing. It's funny because some people might remember that Olympic game that was around in like 1995 - I just remember my brothers and I playing, and it was the same thing pretty much just 15 years later!

In the ACER pavilion, we heard some good beats outside so we figured it was Deadmau5 that was up on the stage, and it was! So he started a bit earlier, but that was fine by us!

I have amazing video footage of this, so can't wait to put this all together. We decided to make a ''Volunteer train'' to the front of the crowd and it pretty much worked. There were a LOT of young kids (like 13-17) because it was an all-ages concert, and no beer was served (big fail) but we still had sneaked a bit of rum, every morning I basically make sure to have my rum on me... You just never know!

After a while, we decided to get out, my brother and I were getting pretty hot and it was pushy alot and we wanted to go dance in the back. Brendan, having a head over everyone, was obviously fine, but we left anyway. On my way out we met this guy that is friends with another of my friends from Montreal in the Olympics, and we started talking and he ended up chilling with us all night (He works at the Olympic village)

Anyway, the concert was very good in general, we were upfront for Ghosts and Stuff and people went nuts for it. Unfortunately, it wasn't as loud as we wanted it to be to start our dance party in the back, but hey you got to work with what you got!

Many fans had made their own mousehead, these are just 2 of many!

So Deadmau5 got LITERALLY cut off because I'll assume he just wanted to keep playing, and the organizers had to cut him off so the fireworks could start. Basically, he put Never gonna give you up at the end; which confused us a bit, and then they just literally pulled the plug haha! So the countdown to the fireworks had to be modified to start at like 2 or 3 then BOOM! Amazing fireworks! These were GOOD too! With a bit of a light show and everything. I decided to film it so I don't have any pictures, but they were definitely nice.

Afterwards, we went downtown to Granville street to walk around a bit, and we met up with Brendan's friends where we wanted to find a bar, but ended up chilling at the Casino and just having a beer, steph, brendan and I's feet were KILLING so we just wanted to die at that point!

Sidenote: The mascots are almost a joke now - not in a bad way, but in the sense that the people my age are always screaming their names, dressing up as them, etc. and It's pretty hilarious.

Coming back home, we realized there's even more of those rocks piled (Inukshuk) all over on the walkway from Sochi 2014 to the GM Place/BC Place. There's so many, it's incredible!

Only a glimpse..

We had a mishap coming back on the skytrain, taking the last one we thought we had the one going to Surrey but it turns out it wasn't. We had to call for a cab and get a ride with these girls to get back home, which was around 4 am! Long night, thank god I'm off today!

I'm going to see Juste Pour Rire tonight at Granville Island, and it'll be nice to be off. I'm working 9 - 5 tomorrow, for the ''Super Sunday'' because really good games will be on so you better watch. The biggest rivalries will all be playing against each other starting at 12 Pacific, so 3 pm in Ottawa. I will be working the first game, Russia vs Czech and will try to sneak my way into the USA game. It'll be ridiculous in there!!! Afterwards, its Sweden vs Finland.

Here's an article from the Montreal Gazette explaining this amazing day of hockey tomorrow.

So! Hockey Day in Vancouver tomorrow will be on! I'll probably go to Granville Island after I sneak into my USA Game (hopefully) to check out Cowboy Fringants, and go out late because I'm only working late monday.

The hockey I'll be covering: Women's semis monday, Men's quarters tuesday & wednesday, Men's semis friday, Men's Bronze saturday and men's final sunday!

That's it for now ! Peace and love

I have found AMAZING pictures of the games here. Check it out!

Day 7: Another Canada Game, Another Sweet Seat

2010-02-18T22:47:00.000-08:00

So today was just another 'Ordinary' day for me. I kind of got myself out of an outside position to be usher again on the 3rd level. I really love that job, and considering maybe applying for Sens for the games, why not? I make friends with a lot of the people in my section and I think they all appreciate it. I don't think I'm too uptight, loose, or just plain stupid to be there and people also respect me. Also, I obviously love the drunk guys that go at the noon games, get there at 10 am to be at their 6th beer by noon. They really entertain me.

Also, let me point out a few things of the games I've realized that I felt like sharing:

- Americans really overdo their costumes. I've done two full USA games now for the hockey, and all the people from Seattle can go right back there if they want! Always tacky costumes, they are nice people of course, but ... I just feel like ... You know who they are

- Luge doubles is really awkward to watch in any shape or form

- I am a bit tired of seeing the same Vancouver videos over and over again

- The cleaning crew in between games go NUTS so they can clean within an hour. It's a lot of work, kudos to them.

- What makes the difference between NHL And Olympic hockey games? FLAGS. There are just tons everywhere. People come for the games of the European countries and decide to usually buy a flag of which ever country they decide on, and it's great because it keeps the spirit in there !

- Somebody put up a ''Free Tibet'' flag today. Was kind of funny.

- I heard today somebody bought a ticket for the gold medal game in the 300's, for 2,700$. A friend I met tonight bought tickets for Russia tonight for 300$ a piece, last row in the 300's.

- I do realize how lucky I am to be usher most of the time, but I am putting myself in that position.... screwing the system a bit...

- I have never heard the OH CANADA so many times in a day constantly ever.

- It is SUNNY now!

- Alcohol places are open till 11 pm to pick up the booze! Wow!

- I gave these little girls my volunteer pin today because they were all amazed at this older lady having so many. It's a limited edition - obviously I don't care about the pin, because, most of you know me and know that collecting pins, wouldn't be a thing that I do haha! Anyways, there was three little girls, so I think I caused more of a problem because they started fighting about who was going to keep it (in a cute way) Anyway,,, there was my Mother Tereasa Moment.

Now, to the interesting facts. So, as I finish my shift today, I started scouting out downstairs which seats weren't being touched at all. That's when Judy, who's from outside of Montreal, and very french, and very much have the same personality, we decided that we'd meet up in the bathroom, get changed and go downstairs to those seats. So we did. Basically, if they see you in the blue coat, you will get kicked out the seats. But since I had a black shirt, hair tied up, and a green cap, I was totally undercover.

As I'm typing this, I see the CTV News saying something about the empty seats at GM Place. Okay, there are a bunch of seats that are not sold because: A) they are blocked off by media view, so they can't sell those B) There is about 3 sections in the 300's that is reserved for Athlete seating - and they are never full, like ever and C) I think scalpers have a hard time selling the tickets right before the games, and they end up not sold. Hence, why I can go and hop in there, just as long as you act cool enough.

Hey I'm telling you the secrets of the trade, you guys better not rat me out! Anyway, on to the important part: The Canada game! It was ridiculous! I've never been so much into this as I was in the third period. I can honestly say I was like somewhat okay with Swiss scoring, make the game a little tighter, but never did I have a doubt until the last 5 minutes that we were maybe going to lose.

The seats, were the most amazing thing ever. Everybody was so into it, and we were really lucky nobody ever came to claim them. I took many videos hoping to catch that winning goal but it DIED before I got anything. So I didn't get anything on my camera for the shootout, but you can check out my Twitvids here and here. As some of you know, I update pictures and videos live on my twitter, so when the crowd goes nuts I'll usually catch it on tape and send it off right away! Note: The crowd went wild when Crosby scored, and they were screaming HILLER To the goalie when he was in our end. Which I thought was a bit unsportsmanlike for the Olympics, but I think we want it so bad and didn't want to accept to have a potential loss... Do anything they can.

If you were watching on TV, I got on the phone with my parents and told them you could see me from that camera, which you could, it was pretty funny. That's how close I was!

Anyway, enough with the blah blah. Here are the pictures of tonight!

Now I also made a friend, like I said, and she is a driver for the Hockey Federation driving around big shots. I think she'll become my new undercover seat sneaker. Here's the pic:

She's doing a blog just like me. And Here is it: http://judy612.blogspot.com/ Mais elle vient de Montréal donc c'est tout en français!

On va probablement se rencontrer dimanche pour essayer de se trouver des sièges pour la partie contre USA et ensuite aller voir les Cowboy! J'ai hâte!

So that's it for me! Two posts were enough for me. I had to update everything, I felt like you guys didn't get much lately!

My plans this weekend: Friday work 9 - 5, Daudmau5 Yaletown LiveCity at 7:30 with Louis and Stoggy; Party somewhere after until late in the night!

Saturday - OFF! Night: Soirée Juste pour Rire - Place de la francophonie (Granville Island)

Sunday - Work 9 - 5; try to sneak some seats if not go straight to Cowboy Fringants!

Okay I'm absolutely beat, it's been hard leaving downtown after Canada plays but I'm so beat after standing up all day with everything I'm doing, then putting all my energy into cheering.

Good night!

Gen

Day 6: Media & Place Franco

2010-02-18T22:15:00.000-08:00

Well, I'd first like to thank everybody who recognized me on television the other night. I'm pretty sure I made my national debut the best way ever. I immediately got a bunch of texts, emails and then on my facebook some people were saying how they saw me. What a moment that was!

Now, onto my day that was yesterday. First off, at work, I got deployed in media. So I got to work with the big shots, or so I thought. But I first had to block the entrance to the media because it's completely blocked off for them - so If you are at section 109, and want to get to 101, you got to go around, and you don't know about that. So who's the person to tell you that? ME! So you can just imagine how people would get ridiculously mad at me, all the time! Wow! Examples; infront of his children ''Well this is just retarded, this is so stupid, I can't believe this, it's RETARDED!''; ''Canada's really an embarrassment'' ''This is just plain ridiculous, you guys will make me walk all the way around? No, this makes no sense''

Like really, Canada? You will make a fuss because the rink has been modified to accommodate the Media centre which is necessary for any arena, and because you're SO lazy and don't walk around? Or because you're late and it'll take you too long? Wow, your LAME! That's all I gotta say. Anyway, I got my load of whining people yesterday, let me tell you that!

Moving on to the other part of my Media job - I was ushering basically mid section at 105, so it was really sweet, got a really good view of the Finland game. Koivu up close!

Afterwards, I went around downtown and met up with Marc, a friend from Ottawa. We then went to Place à la francophonie for a concert with Marie-Mai, Eric Lapointe, Kevin Parent, Porn Flakes, etc It was really fun! Here are some pictures:

Kevin ParentMarie-Mai + autre + Plastique Bertrand - Oops, ENCORE! Toute la gang, incluant Eric Lapointe

Overall, le concert étais vraiment bon. C'étais vraiment relaxe - c'est toute des francophones pas mal donc tu te sens vraiment comme si tu es amis avec toute le monde déja. Meme les artistes étaient ben relaxe avec nous. On avait de la place pour danser, le tout étais vraiment bien. Ensuite on s'est déplacé vers le Club Adrénaline ou il y a eu une fille de Casselman, Melissa, qui a chanté quelques cover. On étais les seuls franco-ontariens dans la salle donc c'étais pas mal drôle dans le fond!

Alors j'ai très hâte de retourner a Place franco - avec mes intentions d'y aller samedi soir pour la soirée Juste Pour Rire avec Louis-José Houde, Mike Ward, et pleins d'autres comédiens (tout gratuit) et ensuite dimanche soir pour les COWBOYS FRINGANTS! Woo!

C'est pas mal tout pour cette soirée - il y a eu aussi quelques bières de 7$ en consommation et du rum and coke illégal pour le concert!

Day 5: Pinch me, k?

2010-02-16T21:58:00.000-08:00

Alright, so today was my first real shift because well, let's be honest, it was men's hockey. I was really excited to come work and check out how the atmosphere was going to be.

Well first off I decided to pick up the same number I had taken last time for the deployment - which got me back to usher where I was for the woman's. If you want to see the numerous pictures I took from my phone throughout the day, you can go to my Twitter account and check out the latest pictures and videos.

For the USA v SUI game, I would say that it was 25% USA, 5% Suisse and 70% Canada for people and what colors they were supporting. I think a lot of americans came out from Seattle for this. They kept chanting ''U S A U S A'' during the games, or Let's go Suisse tap tap tap tap tap (I think). Anyways, the swiss kept USA on their feet I can definitely tell you that, and all truly canadians were hoping they'd score the first goal, but no go.

Here are a few pictures between the two games, when the cleaning team were going nuts (it was a whole new crew of people, trying to clean an arena within an hour - good luck!) Which subsequently made everybody wait outside, all the Canadian fans as you can see! These are all little things that back home you don't realize, but seeing it up close you think how crazy it is for an Arena to host 3 big games in one day. It's gonna be this way until the Quarters, wow, it'll be NUTS!

Employee debrief

In between games

Hosts taking a break

Lineup outside, wow!

Absolute crazyness

So you can see that before the Canada game, people were getting ansty to get in. From what I heard, it was a really good atmosphere in the streets.

So, I do my usher part until 5 pm for the Canada game and a bit disappointed that I won't get to see Canada score their First goal. So I get off, and this random guy asks me where he can find a ticket booth because his friends and him want to upgrade to seats down in the 100's they've been eying and there's definitely nobody. I basically tell him it's impossible, then say that he could probably sneak in there if he wanted to. It only took that for him to take off the jersey off his back, give it to me and tell me to go put it on. So I basically shove my jacket into my little backpack, put on his jersey, and hide everything volunteer about me. He buys me a beer, we go to the 100's to find the section where he's talking about.

He calls up his 3 friends that are wearing painted on t-shirts, and tells them to come down. We basically WALK into section 103 in between the first and the second no problem, then just sit down in these ridiculous seats, behind the media and where CTV has their hockey desk. Unbelievable. I'm kind of risking all my privileges of being a volunteer but it was SO worth it!

So we proceeded to go on TV a couple times from the texts I got, and one of their friends got a snapshot of the TV when they were on - and you can see that I was right on the right side of the guys, just cut off in that pic, but I was there, and also again on TV later.

yeah, im on the left and these are my new freinds. sorry mom!

Anyways, we stayed there for the rest of the night, and it was amazing. Here is the view that we had:

So, what a night! Two of the guys were coming back to Surrey so I hitched a ride with them, perfect night!

PS Media, if you ever pick this up, please, don't put me in trouble, thanks!

This is exactly what happened ... as raw as it gets!

Also, Robson Square is retarded right now, everybody from hockey basically walked over there and its a riot ( a fun one) but went back home because I have many 9 - 5's this week (until friday) so I got to rest sometimes, and after epic nights like this, I just don't mind!

Alright!

OHhhh HABS FAN: You will love this. After each canada goal, they play OLÉ OLÉ OLÉ OLÉ, amazing right! hahaha. Excellent!

Team Canada Love,

Gen

Day 4: The Oh Canada's keep on coming!

2010-02-16T00:29:00.001-08:00

So you would of thought the Monday things would have settled in? Nope, Robson Square is always jammed packed so is Granville street (Think Granville as Elgin back in Ottawa, and Robson Square being the heart of the Market or something)

I went downtown tonight and met up with Louis and Stoggy, as they are here for the week because Stoggy's Dad is the CEO of the canadian paralympic team, has the infinity sign pass, and they get VIP's in ridiculous high class parties (Liberal party, UK Investment, sounds fancy). Anyway, had a beer with them and Henry the Dad, then we went off to find a restaurant. Going through Robson we could see it was still pretty crazy. Here are a few pictures of the night downtown:

On the bobsleigh weeee!

From where they report at CTV Olympics basically.

Robson Square

Posing

The boys getting pulled by the collar with batman

I must say the buskers came out tonight! There were definitely a few around town, we didn't stay around too much because well the boys were hungry.

We weren't sure what to do, so we went back to Saskatchewan, Ontario and Québec pavilion. And surprisingly, Sask wins this one! They had a Ska band playing as we came in (as where Québec the band was done, and Ontario was a huge lineup outside in the rain, so we only did the 4d Theatre again) That pretty much sums up the night. We ended up visiting a casino quickly and ended at the Poker Room. I anticipate very awesome things coming up, and I start working for real hockey (men's) tomorrow.

Good night!

Couple Days Off...

2010-02-15T12:27:00.002-08:00

Since men's hockey only starts tomorrow, all my shifts start tomorrow with only February 20th (Saturday) and February 25th (Thursday) that I'll have off. I decided to take it easy yesterday, and today I play on going downtown around supper time. So I'm ready for things to get hectic!

Meanwhile, I just wanted to point out to you guys a few links that I found were pretty interested.

I thought it was really cute that the men's downhill ski teams renamed themselves the Cowboys Ski Racing team. I find it makes them more personable and as well as a reason to follow them through these races.
Looking for a picture of them, I came across this and thought it was hilarious. It's not them....

Also, I follow Vancity Buzz and 2010vanfan for different updates of cool stuff happening. Vancity Buzz being more about specific events and sightings around Vancouver, and the 2010 VanFan is a volunteer I think in media documenting it all similar to me. She has tons of pictures from the opening ceremony from her point of view - which was exactly what I went through when going on Wednesday for the rehearsal - except we didn't have the swanky white outfit, flashlights, tamtam's, etc. But you can see how the venue looked from a spectator point of view! Which, I wasn't allowed to bring anything in there, so that's why I don't have anything! Also, I found really nice professional opening ceremonies pictures here: Masey's blog

Also, I follow different people on Twitter where I get good updates: @24hoursvan @CTVOlympics @cowboysracing @vancitybuzz @masey @2010vanfan @highfivecanada

Anyway, I came across this:

Amazing! Vancouver Dance Flash Mob? Why wasn't I there? Actually that was Saturday and I was working, so I'm not too pissed to have missed it!

Also, a Oh Canada in the streets. Can you guys imagine this?

I'd like to also point out there ridiculous protesters going around, and who smashed windows at the Bay (Olympic Store is there - talk about the people in there when I bought a backpack wow!)

Here is an excerpt from a CBC article:

Some protesters sprayed vinegar in officers' eyes, threw sticks, and spit on officers, police said.
Two officers were injured with flying objects and one was sent to hospital with a shoulder injury but was treated and released, said Const. Lindsey Houghton.
The 125 officers assembled in two rows, along with six police officials on horseback and managed to hold back the crowd, estimated at 1,500.
No protesters were injured.

Few pictures:

I just think they are ridiculous and apparently have had their say for the weeks coming up to the Olympics according to the people here, gah, frustrating. I love how the media interviews them sometimes and they sound ridiculously stupid, way to go, protesters, way to go.

Tonight I'm probably gearing up with my camera to go play full-on tourist. Maybe meet up with Louis and Chris and god knows what else! I'm working tomorrow 9 am - 5 pm, stay tuned on Twitter, as I sneak tweets as I work...

Happy Monday!

Here are a few cool pictures:

First shift, Robson Square

2010-02-14T12:24:00.002-08:00

So first I'd like to point out I didn't bring my videocamera last night because of my first shift but I bought a little bag and now I can bring it everywhere and document this even better! So all these pictures were sent to my Twitter where you can follow me if you want the up-to-date pictures and videos that I upload on a hourly basis basically throughout my nights.

Wow! So yesterday was my first shift. Got to the place, and there was a room with tons of volunteers for the ''debrief''.

From there, they supervisors each took the groups (assigned randomly by a number you pick up at first) then off to your spot you go. I was assigned to be usher, which was pretty much the sickest job. Interact with people, watch the hockey game, it was really good. I was really surprised at the amount of enthusiasm people had for the women's hockey game. Even though they scored 18 goals, each time people would get up and cheer like crazy, and they also gave a standing ovation to the Slovak team at the end, basically, a pity cheer. Oops.

Also, I could see the RDS table from where I was stationed (Section 311). Second note: GM Place is tiny!! They don't even have level 200's, it's really small.

The empty rink.

Anyway, I was done at about 8 pm, because women's hockey definitely doesn't have as many whistles as a regular men's hockey game. I met a policemen, Walter from Edmonton, at the doors that I was stationed at, and at least we could talk hockey, he was pretty damn cool. The other volunteer girl on the other hand, a little goody-too-shoe for me, we didn't get along that great...oh well.

After the game, I went in line for the Ontario 4d Theatre, which was really cool. I met two older volunteer ladies in line so we talked for the whole 30 minute wait, they were from Surrey too, and we had a good Olympic chat. They worked at the residential services at the Athlete's village. This theatre literally made it seem you were there, like it's actually that much better than the regular 3d, and would recommend it (and the wait) for anybody in Vancouver right now. It's also Disney-esque with things like water splashing in your face at the right times. Really something to see, I might even go back and see it again.

That was me with one of the ladies I met in line. There were really nice. I've been meeting so many people! Just on the bus on the way to Surrey, an older man sat beside me and we started talking and realized that we BOTH came from Orleans (and this is a surrey bus I'm talking about) and that we BOTH live in Queenswood Heights, and that he's given sand to my dad before (my dad Would!)

After that, I went to Robson Square so I can meet up with Louis and Stoggy but then they were too drunk and too ''good'' for me basically, so I watched the show they were hosting. It was pretty cool - Snowboarders, skiiers and hockey players ziplining over the place, there was fireworks, fire shows, and a whole lot of other cool things.

Snowboarder over Robson square, bad image :(

I also have videos here and here of the Canada Hockey Place without anybody in it, and people that were in a balloon at Robson Square that they eventually popped off.

I realized I can upload videos now to Twitter, that are around 30 seconds long, I had a really long one but it was too big to be uploaded... It showed all the cool stuff that was happening at Robson Square.

I went to the Irish House for a while. That place was pretty cool - think Heart & Crown in basically a bit open area with tons of drunk people, once again. I'm going to try to go back sometime! I'm sure there's a crowd going any night of the week.

That was pretty much my night, not drunk this time ha ha! So my shift was amazing, I can't wait to go work again, unfortunately for Steph who had his first shift he was less than impressed... weather was way too harsh, really sucks for him.

Alright! So, stay tuned on Twitter, and I'm off till Tuesday, not sure what I'll be doing till then.

Happy V-day!

''Is it Canada Day?''

2010-02-13T11:09:00.001-08:00

That was the question I asked my brother when we got downtown after the ceremonies.

So yesterday, oh boy, first real day that we decided to venture out and see what the party scene is like. First, we met up with my old prof from Louis-Riel, M. Dregas, at a bar downtown, said hi, then decided to walk over to Granville Island, Place de la francophonie, to check out what was going on there.

Here is the lantern festival.

Yes, I take pics of steph all the time.

Granville Island.

So after we got there, we watched the ceremonies on the big screen but under a tent because it was raining so hard. We met a couple; one guy originally from Ottawa with the girlfriend from Vancouver, they were pretty funny and had good talks. Also the girl beside me was from Québec but moved to Vancouver a few years back and never went back to Montreal haha! So then after the ceremonies, we went to Club Adrénaline and my brother started talking to some people, while some boys sat beside me and I made a stupid comment probably... anyway, we started talking, and then went to see Malajube perform somewhere else. These boys were hilarious, they were from Université de Sherbrooke so for me that was winner, I told them about Ottabrooke, and they were 5 guys that bought an RV for 5,000 and they parked somewhere downtown, paying 20$ each, pretty much near chinatown and the poorer part of town. Anyway, I chilled with them for a while, partied way too much, had way too much rum and coke from a gigantic bottle, and we ended up with them pretty much all night. After the concert, we took the Olympic line and then went downtown for some shenanigans. It was hilarious, I have a lot of videotape so you'll see it once I decide to post up some videos.... I want to make sure to note that we went downtown around 11-12am and it was absolutely crazy!! People screaming, flags everywhere, people on everybody's shoulders, you would think it was either Canada Day or when the Sens manage to win a playoff game!

Downtown!

The RV! amazing.

New friend.

So I doubt this is my first and last adventure with strangers, all in all, it was very fun.

I exchanged phone numbers with one of the guys, with a drunken talk about Whistler tomorrow or something, god knows what!

Afterwards, when it got too sketchy with the homeless, we decided to book it for the skytrain around 2:30 am and then took this bus, leaving us with 30 minutes walk to the house. It was a long walk.

Opening ceremonies: I thought that it was much better seeing them live, although we were able to see things that we couldn't of before on TV. I hope you guys liked it, although I know that some people are disappointed, I think people should cherish this moment.

Alright, now I'm off to my first shift (2-9 pm) covering the women's hockey, then I have a two-day break to go party some more!

I'm not bringing my camera tonight because I'm not sure how it will work out over there. I'm hoping to buy a little backpack so I can bring my camera for whatever I'll be doing afterwards.

To report back soon...

PS: You can leave me comments after my blogs just there, don't think you need to sign up or anything. Would love to hear from you guys, or if you have any questions!

Oh Canada!

2010-02-12T14:24:00.000-08:00

Because I didn't want to leave my blog on such a negative note, I wanted to show you a video made by Classified I found on @Masey's blog.

Let's be proud tonight!

I might be drunk-twittering tonight!

Bitter-Sweet Day

2010-02-12T14:04:00.003-08:00

This really saddens me. I am writing this with tears in my eyes as I can't even imagine the feeling of crashing mid-training and facing your death.

A Georgian luger was killed today in training in Whistler in one of the hardest courses seen and he was thrown into a pillar in a curve. Some other lugers are saying you have a 50/50 chance of passing that curve without crashing (this article written BEFORE the crash), because there was about a dozen other crashes at the same curve, in earlier training runs. None of them were fatal though. He was going up to 150 km/hr in that curve. They say: its a 152-metre drop. Its the longest in the world and equivalent to 48 stories.

Here is a link where you can see some pictures here and here although some may be graphic.

RIP. And I hope they modify the Opening Ceremonies tonight to do something in his honor. He was only 21. Imagine going to your first Olympics, and never coming back... Its really sad.

Here are a few pictures. Source: Toronto Sun & Vancouver Sun

Sad Sad Day. Our thoughts are with him.

Here is the latest article.

Training and Poker

2010-02-12T12:46:00.001-08:00

So yesterday was pretty relax, we only had to go to our training where they showed us little videos on how to do stuff correctly, we were the last training, they had 88 of those, wow!

There were more people. Afterwards, we went downtown beside the BC Place again, where I can't wait to go see the Ontario Pavillion, Quebec House, Molson Canadian house (Playing all the hockey games, huge huge beer tent!) and the Russia House. With that, the Casino was right beside where my brother was going to play Poker and he asked me if I wanted to play, kind of hesitated at first, but decided to play.

Downtown vancouver - Russia House

Athlete's village.

Anyway, poker ended up really fun, was very sociable, but Steph said it was a bit more sociable than usual. I tried to play it off as a pro but that lasted as long as 10 seconds. It was my first time ever at a real table, and people were really nice, and joking with me the whole way. Everybody thought it was really cool I was there with my Brother for the Olympics, and this is not only here, but everybody that we meet thinks that doing that together is pretty awesome.

At around 12:30 we proceeded to take the skytrain back home:

That's it for last night! Tonight we plan on getting kind of drunk and going down to Place a la francophonie to watch the Opening Ceremonies on the big screen then head to Club adrénaline. Then TOMORROW is our first shift! Wooohoo!

Oh and the rain is only supposed to be here until tomorrow, might clear up for Sunday!

We've been meeting people everyday, just yesterday met somebody from Chicoutimi, Calgary, Montreal, etc and some people our age from Ottawa at the meeting. Can't wait to be at CHP and meet some of my coworkers, then I think things will get much more interesting!

Today is the day!

PS Watch the ceremonies, they are amazing. Really!!

PPS: I got a shout-out from (@Masey) on his blog, http://ow.ly/16oCS I'll have to start working on my english if other people start reading this : )

Opening Ceremonies!

2010-02-10T22:56:00.000-08:00

So I just came back from the Opening Ceremonies - and I can tell you I was so impressed with what Canada has to put on.

I'll tell you a few things, snowboarders and skiers - you will definitely love this! Also, they very much included the aboriginal people in the ceremonies which at first I was skeptical about but it turned out very cool. You know how we thought we'd never beat what the Chinese did at the Summer games? Well basically we took what we have the most - Diversity - and built on that to make an amazing opening ceremonies.

The singers are standard, nothing too crazy (Celine Dion wasn't there, but I still have a tiny bit of hope she will pop out of nowhere on Friday without rehearsing because of her amazingness and the ability of near nothing of people keeping a secret) and when they would name the flag bearers, or torch bearers the announcers just wouldn't say anything.

The crowd will have an important part to play with small flashlights given to everyone - so you can imagine what kind of effect they will be going for.

One thing I can say : It looks like a Winter Wonderland. The joke of the night was that it looked way more like Winter olympics within BC Place than outside! I want to say so much more but I think I'll keep it to that. There was a part I thought was long - It was really cool, just long. But the rest I was really satisfied with.

We had volunteers stand-ins for the Premiers of the countries and the keynote speakers which was quite hilarious, as well as stand-ins for the athletes, and we would cheer for random countries like Jamaica or Africa. There were the most of athlete stand-ins for Canada (I imagine they had the exact number) and the people went crazy, just for some volunteers.

The CEO talked to us before the ceremony thanking the volunteers, bla bla bla. I guess it was a good place for him to reach out to everybody at the same time. The place wasn't full - I'd say 60-70%.

Also, we did a wave during the countdown to the start - I've NEVER seen such a sweet wave. Absolutely EVERYBODY was in on it, and you know how usually the 100's aren't really doing it, well now it was everyone and screaming also when the wave was coming to their side. Just that made my night.

Anyway - This was quick, and conclusion is that tonight made just coming to the Olympics worth it.

If you actually want more details as to who performed and what's the overall theme, e-mail me, I'll see if I want to tell ya ;)

Good night from V-Town

Uniform & Accreditation!

2010-02-09T18:51:00.001-08:00

Well, today I picked up my accreditation and uniform, and before that my opening ceremonies rehearsal tickets, and we were able to get two extras for Gilles, my friend's Dad where I'm staying at.

Between the tickets and getting the uniforms, we went sight seeing as tourists on this Tower made for that exactly, here are a few pictures:

Downtown Vancouver

Steph with the two free bottles of win we got from the ticket pick-up

BC Place and GM Place

Over looking north vancouver

After that, we went to pick up our uniforms.
Which looked like this:

Those were only the sample sizes too, they had so many boxes for the real ones!

And here is the final outcome of it; Steph couldn't get a picture that looked decent smiling, so we had to take a gangster one unfortunately, so there's one of me alone after, because I am happy so I don't think it does me justice!

This is what I'll be wearing at GM Place, Steph got snowpants, I have these weird stretchy pants.

We met this woman form Montreal coming back from the uniform pickup on our way home and we had a very good talk, and she'll be volunteering with me at the GM Place so that's going to be fun!

Tonight we are taking it easy, got some Little Ceasar's pizza - how long ago did we see that!

I'll be back tomorrow with Opening Ceremonies ''spoilers'' if you may...

Later :)

First morning in Vancouver!

2010-02-09T08:31:00.000-08:00

So, this is my first morning in Vancouver.

Picked up my brother Steph at the airport last night - and there was tons of athletes and volunteers there. It was covered in Olympic signs, you could really see we were right in the middle of it!

The flame was actually in Surrey last night - where I'll be staying for the month. It's going to take me around 45 minutes to get to work, with one bus and one skytrain. I rode the skytrain yesterday - got a glimpse of Vancouver which was pretty cool.

If it wasn't for an older man helping me to get into that train, don't think I would of made it! I think people were a bit angry I had a snowboard bag + luggage bag + backpack although the people around me were very nice.

The house is very nice, here are a few pictures:

ITS SO GREEN!

Okay, so it literally feels like in April/May in Ottawa over here. Everything is green, and kinda wet, really really reminds me of my birthday month. And I don't particularly like those transitions months, like give me snow or give me summer.

Also, the rain! THE RAIN
Look at the forecast:

Long Term Forecast Updated: Tuesday, February 9, 2010, 8:00 PST

	Wednesday Feb. 10	Thursday Feb. 11	Friday Feb. 12	Saturday Feb. 13	Sunday Feb. 14	Monday Feb. 15

	Light rain	Light rain	Cloudy with showers	Light rain	Light rain	Light rain
P.O.P.	80%	80%	80%	80%	60%	60%
High	7°C	8°C	10°C	10°C	8°C	8°C
Low	3°C	5°C	7°C	8°C	3°C	3°C
Wind	NE 5 km/h	E 10 km/h	E 10 km/h	SE 10 km/h	S 15 km/h	N 5 km/h
24-Hr Rain	5-10 mm	20-30 mm	15-20 mm	20-30 mm	close to 10 mm	5-10 mm

K THANKS VANCOUVER!!!!!!

I cannot believe the weather, 7 straight days of rain? Really? WOW.

Today I'm going to pick up my uniform as well as my rehearsal opening ceremonies tickets.

See ya!

Finally in Vancity

2010-02-08T10:39:00.003-08:00

I'll take you from the start - plane and all:

Sunday very early;

Right now, it is 4 AM Ottawa time but in Edmonton time, it’s unfortunately 2 AM and I have to wait until 5:30 AM to see if I’ll be able to find a shuttle to get me to VIA Rail in time. My flight from Ottawa to Toronto was relatively short and sweet, and I had 2 seats by myself. Now, getting in Toronto sucked for 3 reasons: No free wi-fi like in Ottawa, the Sens were getting beaten 4-0 by Toronto and I felt like secretly all the Leafs fan were laughing at me, and I spilled my Tim Horton’s soup all over my jogging pants, great. But, it seems that the Olympic Gods wanted to make it all better so when I checked in (didn’t have my seat number) they gave me 1F. Took me 2 seconds to take in that I’d be going in first class.

I wish first class was this...

Now, I never thought First Class would be that much better than regular, but wow, are those flight attendants ever almost your slaves! Poor things. We were only 4 out of a possible 12, so I really had all the attention I could get, as well as I was in the first row all by myself, once again. The food and drinks are continuous (ordered water at first until I realized I could get free beer, Thanks!) And I kept being awkward with all the things they would offer me, because half of the time I had no clue what the etiquette was. There were a few awkward situations with the flight attendant, let me tell you. Ice cream and warm cookies? Thanks. Real meal on real plates and not being charged for it? Thanks. Continuous beer throughout the flight? Thanks. Three pillows and a blanket? Thanks!

Anyway, now I’m going to be hopping on the Train soon and this is really where it all starts! I think I’ll be treated fairly well there too considering I’m in a super expensive bed/seat with the 500$ gift certificate (I think economic would have cost about 150 maybe) So thank you Telfer, I shall report!

Also to note, the first crazy hat I bought for the weekend. I’m semi-obssessed…

I love crazy hats.

Sunday, night;

Train.

So the train today was amazing. First, I had to nap from 8 – 12 because my sleep at the airport wasn’t the greatest, talk about the biggest kink in my neck of life. The bus driver woke me up at 5 am and told me he could drive me right away to VIA Rail. Excellent, was there 2 hours early almost!

The cool thing about the train is that a lot of people go by themselves like myself, and we become a little close group. I met a bunch of people on the train, two girls from Ottawa, one volunteering at the speed skating rink and her friend accompanying her, one that is a RCMP show person (yes the people in the red coats and big hats, she has a show everyday on a horse to perform, amazing). Also, a few others around my age.

Met three older ladies, the first I had breakfast with is actually going to be a nurse that Canada Hockey Place with me, so that’s quite interesting, and then another lady who takes the train quite often, who is babysitting her grand-child because her daughter is working in the olympics, and another older lady, around her 70’s, that I spoke with in the bubble train for quite a while, sweet lady. I ended up having supper or breakfast with all three of them at one point, the attendants always encourage you to sit with others when your alone, and you even become friends and joke with the attendants, they were really cool with me.

For sure it was easy for everybody to be talking Olympics because that’s where everybody was going, and we all kept cracking jokes about our hometowns (From Subury, to Pembrooke, to Ottawa to Calgary, to Regina, to Vancouver, etc) and about anything and everything.

The view of the mountains was ridiculous. Never have I been so excited to see mountains, snow and trees. Its so beautiful, I will try to incorporate the most of it in my videos as I took quite a few of those as well! We got some free champagne and wine while in the ‘bubble’ train, all pretty cool.

Here are some pictures:

Highest peak in the Rockies.

In Jasper

Not a cloud in the sky!

Monday, morning;

The sleeping went well, I woke up every here and there, but I did go to sleep at like 9 pm which was odd, and woke up at 12 thinking it was 6 am. During the trip I went back 3 hours which was odd but my long trip made it really easy for me to get used to it.

In the morning, laying in my bed looking outside my window.

So getting in Vancouver was tricky – I decided to drop my two big bags at the station so I could go be a tourist for a while. First, I went to the skytrain to see how I’m going to get to Surrey in all of this, so I go up the stairs and the man is super nice, telling me which train to take and what to watch out for, then leaves to go see somebody and the woman, biggest bitch every (excuse my language) she just comes up to me says I’m not supposed to be here and I could get fined 170$ and that there’s signs ‘everywhere’ saying that. Sorry, I went around after and found one sign saying that I shouldn’t of been there, and nowhere indicating there’d be a fine. It was automated machines, figured people could tell me straight up what I wanted. Anyway, I can’t even imagine being a real tourist and having that as your first conversation with somebody from Vancouver, I’d be really disapointed and I was dissapointed that there wa sa bitch like that telling people off. Why couldn’t she be like her coworker, Geez.

Then it started to pour. Back to the station I go, got a picture of the Russia House, then two big gentlemen told me to go away pretty much, Thanks, Russia. So I’m back to the Train station and will catch a train in three hours.

And the rain, my god, who knew. It really feels like we’re in April in Ottawa – weird to think we’re even hosting Winter games. Poor Cypress Hill, now I really get it.

That’s it for now -

D-DAY : T-Minus 1 DAY!

2010-02-05T07:08:00.003-08:00

Well, I'm leaving tomorrow and it's very exciting. So exciting that I'm going out tonight as a celebration of my last night in town, call it a small going away party!

I'm going to do an extensive blog about the things I want to do over my time in the Olympics. Now, I've been researching a lot about the concerts, parties, and cool things to see in general.

I will start with Place de la francophonie 2010 which will be held in Granville Island. This has from Cowboys Fringants that I'll be going to check out to Louis-Josee Houde in a Juste Pour Rire comedy night. So excited. Here is the link to all the performers if you are curious, it's an extensive list of popular Quebec artists.

Programmation Place a la Francophonie 2010

Air Canada Stage

Also in the free concerts category, I'll be going to LiveCity Vancouver & Yaletown for nightly fireworks, light shows, concerts, and big screen coverage of most of the Olympics. One of the show I'm definitely going to see (with my 2 friends dropping in for Spring Break) is Deadmau5 on February 19 at LiveCity Yaletown. Some of the sponsor pavillions are Coca-Cola, Acer, Samsung and Panasonic Full HD 3d Theatre.

LiveCity - what they anticipate will look like.

Now, since I will be living in Surrey, the O-Zone, situated in Richmond, won't be that far for me to go to. And one of my old favorite bands, Our Lady Peace, will be performing on February 18th. Talking about the O-Zone, there will be other place I'll definitely want to hit up. For instance, the Holland Heineken House which I will FOR SURE be going to. Each night, free cover, and live entertainment starts at 10:30 pm and apparently it's a gigantic party. And, I'm pretty sure I have tons of orange stuff to bring and wear, I'm excited.

It is located in two hockey rinks in Richmond and is only a 5 minute walk from the Canada Line Skytrain Satation therefore it is totally plausible to go there. I have a friend who will be staying in Richmond, and I'm pretty sure we'll be hitting this up a few times! The Vancouver Sun puts it "There are at least three words that immediately come to mind after looking at the information that has been released to date about the venue: Beer. Food. Party." With that link, enables you to look at a virtual tour of what it will look like in there. It's totally my kind of place, I am PUMPED.

Next up, are most of the "houses" that different countries will host. Such as the Dutch house I've just mentionned, there are many more I'd like to visit. Such as the Korea House who will be bidding for 2018 will be pulling all the stops with their interactive pavilion. Apparently, it will be a bunch of high-tech shows, an interactive wall, multi-touch table with clips of Korea in its winter, etc, which will be quite interesting to check out. Some other houses I'll definitely check out are the Ontario House, Quebec House, Irish House, Sochi House (Russia) and House of Switzerland. All of the information on them can be found at City Caucus' Free Vancouver 2010 Events Guide which gave me tons of information on what to do and where.

Apart from that, I've learnt yesterday that Grouse Mountain will be giving away After Hours Pass FREE to all volunteers, and a free DC Shuttle which will let my brother and I go riding from 8 pm - 6 am. The trick is that it's a gondela that gets your from the chalet to the hill, and I've been told if I hop on to that at 5:45 am, I can ski the rest of the day, if I want to. They will be open 24/7, how cool is that ? Also, Grouse Mountain has an exceptional view I've heard. Here is what I've found.

Because of this, I've decided to bring my board because on March 1st, I will be doing something I've been waiting for almost my whole life, go to Whistler Blackcomb. FINALLY!!

I cannot wait to go. I am taking a bus from Vancouver, and it will cost me around 150$ for the day with that, but I'm so excited, it's ridiculous.

Finally, here is a picture of the Athlete's Village which shows Canada BC Place as well as Canada Hockey Place.

Next post will probably be at the Airport in Edmonton, or even from the Train on my way to Vancouver.

Cannot wait!

Lights, Action, HD Camera!!

2010-02-01T06:01:00.001-08:00

This past weekend, I went up to Chicoutimi for a REFAEC - an university conference - and tried my new HD videocamera. It's amazing! I cannot wait to be filming through Vancouver all month long and have some great footage for a wonderful video afterwards that I'll keep forever!

I don't have much else to say, this weekend I'll have to make myself a schedule of what to do, and I'm still unsure of how much clothing I should bring, and all these little questions !

I am leaving this upcoming Saturday, and it's a big deal!

See you around!

9 DAYS!

2010-01-28T12:16:00.000-08:00

I would like to welcome everybody to my new blog, and show you my journey of a month during the Winter Olympics. I am psyched to have been chosen very early on as a volunteer, and unfortunately a lot of my friends didn't make the cut. I was even very close of letting it all go if I wasn't picked for the Canada Hockey Place but - I got that position almost right away, in the early summer of 2009. I got red mittens right when they were available (Thanks Marie-France) and I seem to be very enthousiastic about everyone else showing their red mitten pride - therefore I'm dedicating this blog to my mittens and me, going to Vancouver and discovering the ''Olympic Magic''.

I will be leaving in exactly 9 days to take a plane from Ottawa to Edmonton, and from Edmonton, board on the train to make my way up to Vancouver. Why the train you may ask? Well, basically I won 500$ gift certificate from VIA Rail at the Telfer School of Management Golf Tournament, and figured to use it here - 26 hour train ride through the Rockies with access to the bubble train where I can view all of the beautiful mountains while on my way up to Vancouver, and having free expensive meals and a bed is definitely worth it as well!

I haven't really been too excited about the Olympics until now, realizing how close they are. I have been really busy with student related activities at Telfer, heck, I am even going up to Chicoutimi this weekend for a conference. But I'm starting to be extremely excited, and figured this would be the best time to start a blog, and share this experience for the next month, and keep it as a memory forever.

My brother Steph is coming with me and we'll be staying at my friend's Dad's place, seperate room and all. He hasn't said anything about charging money yet, but we'll definitely pay him something, at least to cover utilities and more. He's already been very generous and can't wait to meet him and live with him, for about a month! My brother on the other hand, will be volunteering at Cypress Mountain, hopefully where they can have enough snow in time!

During my stay, I will be going up to Whistler on March 1st to experience that one mountain I've been meaning to snowboard on. I'm an avid glades rider, and I've been snowboarding a lot at Jay Peak lately. Mont Tremblant is definitely becoming too commercialized for its own good, and Jay Peak has the perfect balance. Next up: Blackcomb!

That's it for now - clearly I'm not the best writer but I will most certainly share beautiful videos, pictures and thoughts during February right here!

Gen & friends with the mittens