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entitled? Or the NOC, who gave me the names and telephone numbers of their
athletes living overseas with instructions to organise their visas, transport and
pre-Games training because the NOC was too busy. Or the Olympic team who
arrived at midday on the day of the Opening Ceremony with no uniforms, no
equipment, no nothing! I could go on but it would only serve to bore you and
send shivers down my spine! Besides, my hair is only beginning to grow back.
But one thing was for sure - I was involved in the Olympic Games and I
couldn't have been more involved without competing. I was working with
the NOCs and was working with, meeting, helping and befriending the athletes;
becoming part of their campaign; working in the village; going to the venues;
watching people achieve personal bests and sharing the disappointments of
others. But I knew these athletes and I felt like I was a part of their campaign. Most
importantly though, I was learning what these people had done to get to the
Olympic Games and how highly they regarded this achievement.
There is a television program in Australia called "Front-up" consisting of a man
with a microphone and a cameraman. That's it. For the duration of the show, he
traipses around the streets of Australian cities looking for people he can talk to.
For the next half hour we are immersed into the life of an unsuspecting human,
who more than likely had just decided to go to the shops to grab some milk
before being accosted by this man and his microphone. And in this half-hour
we learn the deepest, darkest, most intricate details of this person's life. Just
another human on the street, but every one of them has the most interesting
story to tell. None of them have achieved anything to gain notoriety on the world
stage-but they all have achievements and in their own rights they are significant
achievements. I have always thought that this would make for the most interesting
documentary in the Olympic Village.
In Sydney there were 10,200 competitors. Some 300 of them would win
a gold medal. A few hundred more would win a medal of a different hue and
unfortunately, theses seem to be the only athletes the media focus on, and thus,
they are the only athletes we learn about. But all 10,200 athletes in Sydney have
the most amazing story to tell of how they got to Sydney. How I would love to be
the person who could share with the world the lives of these athletes. And what a
documentary it would make. What a promotion it would be for the Olympic
movement. What better way to bring the spirit of the Olympic Games and the
Olympic movement into the homes of the people of the world? Granted, the
Olympic Games is the showcase of the Olympic movement and it is the greatest
show on earth. But I want to meet the people of the Olympic Games and find out
why they were here. I want to hear their stories. This would be education through
Olympism.
But I had no microphone and I could find no willing cameraman. So I was on
my own. What I did have however, were the athletes. Athletes from all over the
world. And so I talked and I learnt. I talked to the archer from Bhutan, who
squeezed his training sessions in between herding his family's cattle. He did not
eat beef as cows are a sacred animal and rather, he drinks the cow's urine as part
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