Hello from Innsbruck!! :)
I arrived two days ago and only now find time to post... sitting in the volunteer centre after an interesting day. I'll try to sum the previous events up:
9.1.
Arrival in Innsbruck. As soon as I arrived, me and a fellow volunteer from Slovenia went to the Innsbruck exhibition centre (where I'm right now!) for our uniforms and accreditations. I am (or was...) a Sports productions assistant, so I'm in the lucky position of having access to all competition venues, as well as to the Bergisel Stadium (opening ceremony), medals plaza (medal ceremonies, concerts and closing ceremony) and the Youth Olympic Village.
Afterwards, we took line Y20, which is a special bus line for accredited staff, to get to the YOV (youth olympic village). My hostel is quite near. :) It is a simple 6 bed room. At this point, I was sharing the room with an American and another Austrian - both Volunteers. After my arrival, I quickly had to rush to Olympia World Innsbruck (OWI) for a dress rehearsal. I was basically watching medal ceremony rehearsals for 2 hours, untill I asked my functional area manager if there's any point of me being there as I'm not part of the ceremony team... she gave me a briefing of my duties as a sports production assistant, and then sent me back to the hostel. :)
10.1.
First day at my venue! I got a tour through the stadium (Ice hockey hall, short-track speed skating and figure skating hall, as well as the olympic speed skating oval (outdoor) and the athlete areas). Afterwards, the sport productions coordinator Maria gave us sport production volunteers a briefing of our duties, answered questions etc. I am the first contact of the international federations (in my case the ISU - international skating union), supervise and brief the mascot teams and help with the medal/mascot ceremonies (making sure the mascot and the IF representant are at the right spots, showing the mascot volunteers where the media zones for interviews are etc.) As today was a day with inofficial training opportunities only, there were no IF representants or visitors at OWI, meaning that I spent the day getting to know my team.
11.1.
Today. ;) Basically, the previous two days were not that spectacular. Had nothing to do. Today I still didn't really have much to do, but I was quite busy nevertheless. As soon as I arrived at OWI, my team's coordinator called me. He had arrived in Innsbruck yesterday and was told to call me so I show him around, give him an introduction to his duties etc. Basically, he coordinates the sports production volunteers for the speed skating oval. He makes sure we get the information we need, brings us warm drinks if we can't leave our work places etc. He also participates in venue meetings, if there's the need to hold one, and takes care of IOC members (I believe... not sure there).
So I showed him around, his name is Manuel, and we spent the morning watching the speed skaters train. Still no official training or competition today, so it was quite relaxed, until Maria (the coordinator of all sport production volunteers at all venues) told us, that the figure skating coordinator (responsible for the sport production volunteers for the figure skating events) didn't show up. Us volunteers at OWI have the problem, that some of our colleagues don't seem to take their duties serious at all, as in not showing up, not doing their work. So far everything has been really chaotic, and this doesn't help either. Manuel, Roman (SP coordinator short-track speed skating), Lisa (SP assistant short-track SS) and I joined Maria at the workforce area to discuss the situation. It turned out that also the SP assistant for figure skating didn't show up... so out of 4 people, 2 were missing in that team. A SP team consists out of following people:
SP coordinator (team leader)
SP assistant (responsible for IFs and the tasks of the coordinator, should he be busy/ill/not here)
SP sound assistant (basically the DJ making the background music)
SP scoreboard assistant (responsible for the scoreboard and big screens at the venue... assisting the official timekeep - OMEGA)
SP young presenter (moderator assistant)
SP presenter (professional moderator)
The figure skating team doesn't have a scoreboard assistant. So basically, we were discussing the situation and came up with the following solution: I will take over and be the SP coordinator and SP assistant for the figure skating events at OWI. The SP assistant of the STSS events Lisa will help me if necessary, as well as the other two coordinators of speed skating (Manuel) and STSS (Roman). We're 3 coordinators and 1 assistant, two people too little. We contacted the workforce coordinator and there's a chance we may get new team members as some people are still interested in joining the volunteer team. You cannot apply for a volunteer job the normal way anymore, of course, the application phase ended a year ago I believe. But in this situation, those interested may still have a chance to get themselves an accreditation and help us. I mean, it's not like it's a catastrophy and the events are in danger. It's just that, for example, on friday (opening ceremony day), I will have a shift from 6am until 10pm. Originally, I would finish at 2pm, but before I changed to the FS team, I'd work as a SP assistant at the opening ceremony, which I was looking forward to... :D So I said that I'll also do the opening ceremony job, in addition to the FS events. Perhaps one of the others will take over the early morning shift, because I'm no longer sure if I can survive a 16 hour shift... xD Especially this one, where I will have to coordinate the transport of the ISU to the Bergisel stadium and back. We'll see. :) With Manuel, Roman and Lisa, I have a great team. We'll help each other, take over shifts etc. to handle the situation better. I didn't have a "normal" shift yet, so I can't judge how stressful it will be. I hope it'll be alright, even though a couple of FS events end at 11pm... actual medal events, meaning that if I don't find a SP assistant, I will have to stay until the end to guide the IF representants to the meeting area for the medal/mascot ceremonies. But it'll be alright I guess. :)
After todays shift, I explored the city centre a little, visited the golden roof, and now the volunteer centre. Tomorrow is the first official training - the first time IF representants may be present and the first time my work phone could ring if the IFs have problems. No visitors yet, no actual competitions, but still. We'll give our best (the workforce manager already complimented us OWI SP-people ^^ saying that we'll get an especially good review) We aren't professionals, this is the first time most of us are working at sport events as large as the Olympic games, but I'm sure it'll go well!
This was it for now. I'll try to keep you updated. :) Until then, stay tuned!!
P.s.: The wallpaper of this laptop in the volunteer centre actually is the same picture I'm using in this blog for my background picture.. xD
