Olympics

[patc]

Yes, I would like to add my congratulations to everyone involved in organising London 2012 including the thousands of volunteers. Just think that, when the UK won the honour to stage them way back whenever it was, someone had to sit down with pencil and paper and say" OK, now, let's see, where do we start?" They must be pretty proud at this moment.

Pat

[jen]

AS a volunteer I can say it was a wonderful experience so many happy faces everywhere.

[Todd]

Why not have ADELE, Coldplay, or ELTON JOHN?!?

Yes, I was very surprised Elton John didn't turn up at either the opening or closing ceremonies. And what about Andrew Lloyd Weber ? Russell Brand also seemed like an odd choice to appear in a Beatles' song performance, although he did have a much better singing voice than I expected (assuming it was his voice). On the other hand, "I Am The Walrus" is a pretty weird song itself, so maybe using Russell Brand makes sense after all !

Having attended the Olympics, I was very impressed with the sheer number of volunteers and police they had everywhere. You never had to look far to find someone who could answer a question about where to find something or to point you in the right direction. The Westfield Stratford City shopping mall was very impressive and will hopefully serve the east side of London for years to come. The venues were also very well built with their future use in mind.

Unfortunately, the frustration of trying to find tickets to events which had thousands of empty seats at "sold out" events left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. They did seem to rectify the situation somehow (after I'd left). But why they didn't anticipate something like that by making tickets available for unused seats the day of the event (like they do at theatre productions) is beyond me. Everyone kept telling us to "go to the web site" to buy tickets but when we did, it said you had to have a U.K. mailing address and they only accepted VISA credit cards for payment (with a valid U.K. home address), none of which we had.

We ran into the grandfather of U.S. gymnast Gabby Douglas at the Westfield Shopping Centre towards the end of our trip and he said he hadn't been able to find any tickets, either, to see his granddaughter compete. Needless to say, he was quite frustrated. We gave him the phone number of a guy we found on Craig's List web site, which is how we were finally able to get tickets the last day we were there. Hopefully he eventually got tickets as well to see Gabby compete.

[ERinVA]

It seems that the Opening Ceremony for the Paralympic Games, which was directed by Stephen Daldry, was quite a success:

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scott ... ny-1287716

[StevenKing]

I'm so glad I was able to see this on tv...owait I'm sorry I forgot I live in the USA...$&@"!

[angelenroute]

It seems that the Opening Ceremony for the Paralympic Games, which was directed by Stephen Daldry, was quite a success:

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scott ... ny-1287716

Love this line from Hawking:

We are all different. There is no such thing as a standard or run-of-the-mill human being but we share the same human spirit.

Amen! As Mrs. Wilkinson sings, "It doesn't matter if you're large or small, trapezoid, or short or tall. Even if you can't dance at all, all you really havta do is SHINE!"