The daily post #100: Game Over (Over to you, Innsbruck & Nanjing!)

We’ve made it. I frankly never thought it would come, but it has.

It’s with great pride, relief, happiness and sadness that I write this post.

The Games have been delivered, and by my measure (I don’t know about you), it’s been a rip-roaring success.

There was so much joy, moments of despair, many dreams realised, many dreams still to be fulfilled, and a whole lot to be thankful for.

With a lump in my throat the size of Sentosa, I would like to thank:

The athletes: For your determination and athleticism that remind us all how pure sports can be and how it can unite us all.

The organising committee and my crew: I’m thankful for the great bosses,colleagues, partners, vendors, and other awesom people I have had the honour of working with, and my amazing New Media team that has hung in there since we started work on this just over 2 years ago. Amanda, Jialin, Kok Siong, Yee Hon, Victor, Nazif and Adeline: You guys rawk. hard.

To the extended family that have come forward to multiply what we’ve been able to deliver during the Games… STARS and volunteers, you don’t know how incredible you’ve been, and how there wouldn’t be a Games without you. I’m proud to have worked beside each and every one of you.

And finally, thank you dear reader for accompanying me on this 100-stop journey. I hope you enjoyed the ride.

This flame may have gone out, but the Singapore 2010 spirit burns on

Don’t stop believing.

 

The (not-so) daily post #97: Where are the days going?

It’s amazing how each day whizzes by before I can even pull up the WordPress page to bang out an entry. I foolishly thought that with the Games under way, that I’d have a little more time to catch up on, and finally finish my #100 entries.

WRONG. WRONG. WRONG.

Between waking up and falling asleep with the TV on, the hours are spent updating the website, sending out newsletters, tweeting, facebook-ing, replying emails, and attending meetings.

I’ve even lost track of the days, being at the Main Media Centre every day for almost 3 weeks now.

As you can see, even this sign to help us keep track of the days has become outdated

But it’s been fun, even if I don’t get out much.

The size of my team has suddenly exploded by about 20 times, and we are overflowing with content! Stories, photos and videos are spilling out of our ears… (See for yourself > Stories > Photos > Videos)

The New Media Lair in full swing (minus the guys slacking off watching TV)

Despite the significantly larger team (we had a small base to begin with, so any increase seems substantial actually), the job doesn’t exactly get very much easier. Depending on how addicted you are to your job (i.e. you don’t want to go home), there are times where you just zonk out at the desk after 1,034,543 hours on the job.

WhyOhGee Editor editing in her sleep. (Not!)

But sometimes we get visitors, and we have to wake up…

Our friend Alexandra from Rio 2016 visits!

Other times, we take a break to remember that there are other moments that we need to celebrate…

Birthday boy Vicson & friends (no interns were harmed in the shooting of this photo)

And the happy/sad thing is, all this is almost over. 🙂 😦

 

The daily post #96: Remember your roots

As we celebrate sports, youth, and the Olympic values, I’d like to also remind athletes (and anyone who reads this blog) not to forget the people who got us here.

Sponsors, coaches, teachers and most of all, our parents.

Just a couple of nights back, we were watching a young shuttler named Huang Chao play his heart out for good reason.

Smash from Huang Chao

Huang moved from China to Singapore in search of better opportunities. That night, he was playing in front of his dad, who he had not seen for the past six years. Can’t imagine what might have been going through his mind then. (Read more about Huang Chao)

A couple of days ago, one of the bosses lost his dad, and another colleague lost her grandmother. As we rush through every day during these Games, let’s also be thankful of all these people who got us here. 🙂

 

Show: The last time I see the Opening Ceremony Stage

After spending close to 4 months working on Opening and Closing Ceremonies (aka OCC), I’ve started to grown attached to the Floating Platform, the Marina Bay skyline, the people I work with, the performers and the security uncle who always smile at me when I walk in.

This entry documents my last trip camwhoring around the OCC Stage.

I'll miss you both (Tong and Lyo) when YOG ends... Do you know Lyo has an official pass to the Float?

Eugene (one of the NS boys we work with), Tong and I under this roof decoration.

we thought of going swimming in the Reflecting Pool

tried to be Godzillas climbing the props

Got eaten and killed by the Dragon Head

guess what it is?

shaking hands and making friends with the Giant Monster

The coils of tubes are actually those washing machine tubes where the dirty water comes out from

 

The daily post #80: Phoney

Being the lead of a team during the Games can be quite a pain in the neck. Literally.

Being in charge means being contactable, means having different means of contact with different groups of people. Thus I’ve got an accreditation pass, a mobile phone, and a walkietalkie-like thing hung around my neck. Plus of course my own personal phone that i thankfully keep in my pocket.

Helloise from next door shows off her connectivity

And I’ve just learnt that we just picked up yet another handset … !!

Maybe we’ll get one of these soon:

No SIM card required (Image from whoislauralee.blogspot.com)

 

The daily post #79: What in the world is a venex?

It’s admirable when people forsake their Sunday sleep-ins, and turn up despite a torrential downpour at a location that they’re unfamiliar with at 8.00am+ in the morning for something they probably have never heard of. (Hence the title of this post)

That’s why I think my volunteers rawk.

The workforce that's going to be based at the Main Media Centre

For your information, venex is in no way related to latex, Tex-Mex, or ‘kleenex’. Rather, it’s short for Venue Exercise (yes, we love shortening things!). But no, we didn’t gather really early last Sunday morning to do jumping jacks together. It was for a much more serious reason…

Not the most serious of pictures, I know

Our neighbour Robert (from Language Services) explains what we do to his team

We needed to orientate them to the place that would be their home for approximately 2 weeks, get them familiar with what they would be doing during Games Time, and make sure they all knew what to do in an emergency. Sorta like Freshman orientation, just without the silly games.

Victor takes the time to photograph the city skyline during the fire drill. (Don't try this at home kids!)

Volunteer does his impression of "Julian on Sunday morning" (that's my work pass)

It was of course, also nice to see how many of them were real people and weren’t fictitious names floating around in cyberspace.

Turns out we’ve got a good bunch of committed people who we can count on when the weather is at its worst! (think another tree or two might have fallen that morning) Though we were a little overwhelmed when we actually saw how many people we had when they all turned up at once.

Victor tries to tell everyone a joke. haha.

But honest to goodness truth, we’re all infinitely thankful to all of you for showing up on a soggy Sunday, and look forward to working with you for the next 3 weeks or so! 🙂

 

The daily post #77: Moving to the Sands

We’ve finally moved our stuff into one of our Games time venues – the Main Media Centre. (We’ve got stuff happening at the Youth Olympic Village at NIE too, but that’s for another blog post.)

Amanda was very focused on packing. Not sure she kept track of what she packed though.

There were lots and lots of boxes, some loaded with pretty delicate equipment, so we had a few shocks when the moving guys started throwing our editing stations like cabbage. :p But we told them about our frail hearts and I think they got the message.

And then we waited for the big truck to take our stuff away...

So off we went… to our new home at the Marina Bay Sands Convention Centre!

That's the sign... and in Francais too. (Didn't know I was working in a bureau!)

We furiously unpacked and set up our stuff, and within a couple of hours, we were practically settled in, save for a few bugbears here and there.

tadah...!

We’ve still got some way to go to make the place feel homely, but I think we’re getting there.

Lyo helps make sure people don't print indiscriminately.

One thing we’re not looking forward to though… re-packing everything at the end of the Games!

We promise not to put Deanna into a box to save on taxi fare.

 

The daily post #72: Athens whirlwind

There wasn’t much time to muck around after the whole flame lighting affair in Olympia.

We had videos to edit, photos to caption, stuff to pack, people to move around, tweets to send, hands to shake, … you get the picture. (So much for catching up on my blog entries!)

Lucky for us, we had a few hours in Athens before having to fly back to Singapore.

Acropolis from afar... very far.

And that’s about as close or as good a view of the magical Acropolis as I could manage.

After checking into the hotel, we were all pretty knackered (or at least I was!) from the day’s events, but still we had to eat, even though it was past 9pm at night! Was told the Greeks eat dinner pretty late.

So off we went to Plaka, on advice from Mr Chris Chan, Secretary General of the SNOC, and experienced visitor to Greece.

Plaka by night

It’s probably as touristy a place as you can visit in Athens, but with enough local flavour to keep me snapping pictures, trinket hunting and stuffing my face – sometimes even all at once.

Shopping or Ruins? I'm spoilt for choice

When you say that Plaka is in an old neighbourhood, it’s really understating it. There are ancient ruins that run right next to the shops.

Thou shall not spraypaint thy ruins

Even the graffiti artists seem to be respectful of what they can, cannot spray on and REALLY cannot spray on – which is cool.

more wall scrawls

This art you can bring home

But all the culture and history in the world can’t fill an empty belly, so it was time for some carnivorous consumption.

Meaty me

And naturally, over food, we started talking and reminiscing about the historical ceremony we were all witness to. Then we decided to relive it all, especially those of us who didn’t get our hands on the torch. :p

Silas (partially concealled) probably wasn't impressed

And even after eating, there was more temptation lining the streets

Funky coloured ice cream = very tempting in the heat.

But we decided to do a little souvenir hunting instead…

Lots and lots to see...

And look what we found!

Amanda blows and blows... but nothing!

We eventually walked away with about 5 vuvuzelas! 😉

And as we walked along with our booty we realised there were things on the pathway that we had to carefully sidestep.

Doggone walkway!

Some of them were a bit more friendly…

Shufen (torchbearer chaperone) gives out a free tummyrub

But more friends started turning up…

Doggy's friend looking for tummyrub too, but we got scared and left

Anyway, that was about it before scooting off to the airport at 4am. :p Sorry we couldn’t get to know you better, Athens!

 

The daily post #71: The A(wesome) Team

I hope all of you managed to catch the flame lighting ceremony in Olympia?

You go, girl!

If you didn’t, you can watch the ceremony in full HERE (58 min 46 sec). Alternatively, you can watch the highlights HERE (3 min).

During the flame lighting ceremony and throughout the rehearsals, there was a team that I worked with on the ground to bring photos and video to you and the rest of the world. In fact, two of them (Matt & Pav) are following the flame throughout its global journey, and another two (Nic & Tony) are leapfrogging over to Mexico City to get things ready there.

L-R: Tony (Producer), me, Wu Wei (photog), Nic (Exec Producer), Yu Yang (photog)

Pav, our video editor (sorry i couldn't find a more glamorous pic!)

Matt, our main camera dude (no, that's not a weapon)

All these guys are true professionals and never once grumbled about the challenging conditions that we were working under (heat, dodgy internet connection, tight timelines, uncertainty about whether we would be allowed in certain positions, etc). Still, they delivered despite some of them possibly even having a brush with heatstroke. You’ll be able to check out their work on our Flickr account and YouTube channel.

Thank you for being part of an awesome Audio+Video+Photo team. Very much appreciated!

P.S. I touched down in Singapore this morning at about 6.00am and was rendered unconscious for about 12 hours, and this is about as much as my Olympia stir-fried brain can handle. More on the Odyssey in Olympia to follow…

 

Show: Combined Rehearsal 1

Rehearsals have been going on daily at at my second home, The Float, where I’m based at. Everyday, I see kids running around in the hot sun rehearsing. My heart really goes out to them. On the other hand, some of them looks like they’re having fun. The Stage’s Reflecting Pool was filled for the Combined Rehearsal on saturday.

performers on the stage

Glorious glorious water

water is good to cool off at a hot rehearsal

I noticed these two girls (who are photographer’s favourites)  and they very kindly agreed to do this short interview for me. Actually, they’re personal friends of mine and I asked them very nicely. (Just between me and you, I bribed them with candy like little kids)

Fiona is on the left and Li Min is on the right

kick and kick, splash and splash

Fiona: I'm strong like a MAN

Name: Fiona Thng Pei Juan
Age: 15
Segment involved : Origins –  dance

3 words to describe your YOG experience so far: Memorable, tiring, unexpected.
2 emotions to describe how you feel: Excited to perform and tiring but worth the efforts.
1 word: how you want the audience to remember your performance:  ENJOYMENT

Smiles for the camera

Name: Pee Li Min
Age: 15
Segment involved : Origins –  dance

3 words to describe your YOG experience so far: Exciting, adventurous, creative
2 emotions to describe how you feel: Exhilarating and optimism
1 word- how you want the audience to remember your performance:  Vibrant

Sunnies makes my day

My own 3 words for my YOG internship will be: Filled with love. Because you can see how much everyone loves this little baby. This baby called YOG.