I fully intended to write about how awesome a time I had during the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics. I never did because I had too much fun during that time. If I were to be succinct, I would say that it was the best time I have ever had in Vancouver. EVER. The city buzzed with a veritable slew of happy (some drunk) people, running about, giving people high-fives, cheering on the athletes of all nations, talking about Canada's chances and generally having a great time.
Transportation worked. I was in downtown Vancouver nearly every day of the Olympics. I was able to get in and out in good time, within reason. I even drove down a few times and didn't run into major issues with traffic.
I went to a couple of curling games. I had an amazing time cheering the players and watching curling of all things with a huge crowd of people.
I spent a lot of time in Robson Square watching the festivities there and hanging out with the crowds. I stood in many, many lines for hours to get in and see various exhibits that various Canadian provinces set up, as well as those of other countries.I had an awesome time at the Holland Heineken House (those Dutch are awesome). I thought the Quebec presentation was odd... because it had no roof or poutine.
Above all, I think I saw Vancouver grow up into a city that was able to handle large events and crowds. We were the media darlings of the wealthy northern world for a couple of weeks. And I think we handled ourselves quite well. The weather wasn't perfect, but hopefully, the weather does not reflect negatively on us in any way. Many folks visited Vancouver (though none I know... sadly) and I think they liked what they saw. I hope they come back.
John Furlong and VANOC (the folks who organised the Olympics) did quite the job getting this thing off the ground and executed an amazing event. CTV did an awesome job of broadcasting the events on multiple TV channels and via the Internet. They didn't do so good a job with the Paralympics. That was unfortunate.
I also think the IOC and the IPC should sit down and figure out how they can run the Olympics and Paralympics together as a 3 or so week event. The overwhelming vibe I got from spectators and friends alike was that it was wrong to separate the two events. They are all athletes, able-bodied or otherwise. And I think Canada would have done better medal-wise. It didn't help that we had a couple of weeks of a break in between because the crowds and the excitement sort of went away.
The substantially overestimated horrors related to traffic, violence and noise and what not did not materialise. I remember prior to the Olympics, all sorts of people were making rumblings of how horrible this event would be for the residents of the city (it was no cake walk, but it was a small inconvenience in my opinion) and how badly off the city, the province and the country would be financially. All the numbers are not in, but I think this was very successful. Lots of people were in the city. Many were Canadian. We all spent a lot of money. We all had an awesome time. Everyone tried to buy those red mittens. Many were not successful. Many also wanted the Canada hoodies. They were sold out!
The Granville Street area that was closed off and had street performers, art exhibits and music was really well thought out. I am sad to see electric wires go back up there for the trolley buses. They should just keep that theme going with closed off sections of Granville Street, add music, art and lots of good food sort of like the food at the night market.
I could go on and on about how good it was, but I don't think I would do justice. As the BC tourism ads said, you gotta be here. Or rather, you should have been here.
A couple of weeks ago, when they opened up the athletes village to the general public (and started selling them to us at high prices), I saw John Furlong (ex-CEO of VANOC). The humble way he approached his job (maybe it was an act, but I liked it at any rate) and the way he carried it out to the end (and the way he dealt with the very tragic death of the Georgian Luger) has made him a very respected man let's say. The overwhelming sense of excitement in that crowd of a thousand or so people that day was that we did such a good job in 2010 that we should give it a go again. I said it all along that should we do well with this, we should seriously put in a bid for the 2024 Summer Olympics.
I honestly think we would make it our own games and deliver a highly successful and very Canadian Summer Olympics that the city and the world will talk about for a while. I think it will also give us enough time to win the bid and get our act together financially and otherwise to make it happen. And if John Furlong is up for it... I'll be the first to vote for the Olympics (there was a referendum the last time around where many city residents made a big deal about voting against the Olympics). And I am not kidding.
Good luck to the Russians in 4 years with this... I hope you can deliver a games as good as we did. I hope we do better medals-wise than we did this time around in 2014. I also hope we rock Canada House in London (I hope they have something like that in London in 2012). Anyway, a bit of a ramble, but to sum up, the Olympics were awesome and I can't wait to have that feeling again in the city.
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