One Canadian for One Heineken

What a day it was in the Village. Actually, today we had a "TV" executive type of day. What does that mean? Well it means we woke up with not much to do and basically sat around all day planning. Then when we got done planning, we told some people what we expected and hit the links. Just kidding, of course, that message was written for Keith Allo who recently checked in to the site. We miss you in the Springs.

Actually what happened in the Village was this:

In the early afternoon we got a call from our Team Processing group (I will explain team processing in a different blog). Anyway, Nancy - the head of our operation and all around team processing guru - gave me a call and said that she had a Canadian Nordic Combined skier who had showed up at the USA processing site. Jason, the Canadian skier, actually trains in Park City, Utah with all of the US athletes. Well the team had been training here in Italy - in a city about 5 hours outside of Torino. So when they left to come to the Games he jumped in with them and ended up at our processing site.

Nancy called me because Jason essentially had no place to go. We couldn't have him in our processing, and he did not have a way to contact the Canadians and he did not have his Olympic accreditation. Nancy's call to me was to ask if we could go and find the Canadians in the Village and figure out what we should do. So I get Nick (another NOC Assistant of ours - we go everywhere with them) and we head over to get a map of the willage and find the Canadian buildings.

I wish I had a camera with me when I went to their building (they actually have a few buildings in the Village). You see there is a rule in the Village that you can't hang flags, etc. Well, one of Canada's buildings had a flag on it that is the size of four of the six stories. Amazing.

Nick and I go into their building area and I use him to speak Canadian (just kidding). We go in and wander up to the second floor and find a guy named Andre. We tell Andre what is going on - that we have a Canadian athlete, we are holding him captive, but would be willing to negotiate a trade (that is the truth of what we told Andre). He asks who and when I tell him he has no idea who Jason is. So I called Nancy and she put Jason on the phone and I put Andre the phone. The conversation, what I can hear, so all Andre, goes like this:

"Who is this"
"What sport do you compete in"
"Why are you here"
"Where are you and how did you get there"
"Where is your coach"
"Stay there, we will come and get you"

So I am thinking this poor kid is never getting here. Well another member of the Canadian Olympic Committee (Denise) goes and finds Jason's combined card (that is what an Olympic credential is called before it is validated and oficially hangs from your neck). Andre then gets a set of car keys, grabs the NOC Assistant for their team (so get this, the Americans and Canadians are talking, yet both have their English/Italian speaking NOC Assistants with them) and tells this guy to get a car and drive me where I need to go.

Having figured he would do that, I was talking with Denise and innocently commented that the empty can of Heineken I saw in the trash can looked good (by the way, it was like 1:00 in the afternoon). She asked if I wanted one. My first thought was - and this is serious - that Eric would LOVE one - so I said yes. I told her we would trade Jason for a cold Heineken. She proceeded to grab two Tim Horton paper coffee cups and cover the can of beer. She hands it to me and says "enjoy your coffee." You have to love the Canadians.

I called Eric and told him I had an ice cold Heineken for him if he drove me and the NOC Assistant for Canada (remember we need help with the language process) to get Jason. That was an easy call as I knew the answer. Needless to say, Eric got his beer, Jason got hooked up with the Canadians, and for one brief moment of time we actually like Canada. Wait....moment is passed.

I will say this - the Canadian NOC Assistant was a born and bred person from Torino. He spoke Italian, English and French. When Eric and I asked him how he learned French, he said he spent "12 days straight frenching with my girlfriend." What he meant to say that was he spent 12 straight days speaking french with his girlfriend because when he met her, she only spoke French and he knew Italian and English, so he learned by talking with her. His answer had us cracking up. Classic. Just another day in the Village.

The ironic thing about that car trip is that the American was driving while the guy actually from this town was in the back seat. Eric just likes to drive because he drives in the bus lanes.

By the way, we did get to see the Super Bowl. Not in the Village though. We went to our operations hotel and watched it there. That made for a long night.

Get ready, it is almost time for the Opening Ceremonies.

Bobby G will be writing tomorrow.