After our initial "driver training" session on February 7th, we never dreamt that we would be saying this: "We miss being volunteer drivers"......maybe not the getting up before 5:00 every morning, but most certainly the people we worked with and the many, many, many other people that we met. For the most part, the days were extremely hectic, but an enormous amount of fun. It kept us "in the thick of the action" and we couldn't believe how fast our 8 hour shifts went by. The especially busy days were those where we had our regular driving shift and then event tickets later on. The lack of sleep and the "venue food / on-the-run diet" probably knocked a couple years off our lives, but we wouldn't change it for the world.
We have been amazed at the response from the public toward volunteers. During the course of every event we have attended, there has been a very public "thankyou" sent out to all the Oympic volunteers. There were more volunteer workers at these Olympic Games than any other (25,000).......they were using it as a tool to keep down costs, but what it truly did was open an opportunity for people like us.
People attending from all over the world (and locally too) were told: "If you have a question....need directions, etc find someone in a blue uniform". People would come up to us all the time....on the street, in the airport, on public transit, in restaurants and ask us "stuff". Usually they just wanted to know what our "jobs" were. Blue uniformed volunteers were a safe spot for anyone and there was lots of us. We became known as Smurfs......in an endearing way.....because of the colour of our uniforms. Our uniforms are also one of the most sought-after and highly-prized Olympic s.w.a.g. but there is no way that we would ever part with ours. We've heard of ridiculous prices being offered and received for the jackets alone. We wear our accreditation badges every day......they allow us to ride transit for free, but there are also hidden benefits: the other day, there were volunteers and security not allowing riders to enter our the Skytrain station (we still don't know what was up) but when they saw our uniforms and accreditation they told us to pass....it felt kind of weird in an "awkwardly privileged" sort of way. Between periods at the hockey games they set up the analysts stage and the hockey pundits do their thing. They were located a couple sections away from our seats and only ticket holders for that section were allowed to pass. Our accreditation allowed us by and we got some awesome, up close shots. People know what you went through to get accredited, so they must figure we are not totally nuts.....boy, did we ever fool them.
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