Fires, Time, and Athletes

When we got home the other night, someone told us that one of the bathrooms had caught fire. I saw a maintenance guy in the closet by the small women's washroom and I asked him about it. He explained that it was just a small fire in the closet of the large women's washroom. They think the broom got too close to the water heater. A couple of girls who went to the bathroom at about 1:30AM found it burning, and it's a good thing they did because it would have spread to the whole trailor! Here's a photo of the scorched patch of floor.

It still smelt like burning.

On Monday evening the girls and I went to see the movie Valentine's Day in a local cinema. When we emerged from the theater and into the Whistler evening, Charlotte Sarah asked if anyone else had forgotten where they were for a minute. "Yes!!!" I agreed, because it was so true. Being here is truly like being in another world. Days on the calendar don't have the same significance as they do back home - there are no Monday Relay For Life meetings, no Tuesday CHS meetings, no Grey's Anatomy on Thursdays. It's as if time and space are frozen here. I'm not looking ahead more than a day at a time because each day holds enough excitement to capture my attention. I'm trying to remind myself every moment that this is an extraordinary experience, and not to let it feel commonplace just because I've nestled into some semblance of a routine here. Each day is to be savored.

This morning we toured Creekside, host of the alpine skiing events. We weren't able to see too much of the venue since we could only go up as far as the base of run, but competition was going on during the tour. We got up to the finish line just as Lindsey Vonn finished her downhill run of the Super Combined event (unfortunately she fell during the Slalom portion and didn't medal). Our 2nd Part Passes didn't get us into the main spectator area because we weren't in uniform, so I couldn't get close enough to get any good pictures of the skiers crossing the finish line, but I could see fairly well. Here are some photos:

We watched from up where those people are at the bottom of the photo

There was a great sushi place just outside Creekside - Blaire and I were so happy!

After that delicious lunch we had some time to kill before our class and didn't want to go back to camp just yet, so we called Sydney and she brought us 2nd Part Passes to the Athlete's Village (I still think it's so cool that we can do stuff like that!). Our mission: accumulate pins! I hadn't been asking people for pins because I didn't have any from Dalton or Mass or USA and I thought the idea behind it was an exchange, but apparently it's acceptable just to ask people for pins. Some people have had good luck from the police officers or other employees at various places. We, however, wanted athletes.

Blaire is determined to get a USA pin, so we stood in WVL near where the athletes go to the dining tent, since it was around lunch time. We spotted some guys in USA jackets right away, and stood awkwardly near them so that we could pounce as soon as they finished their conversation. Soon enough two of them walked toward us a few moments later. "Hi! Where in the US are you from?" Blaire asked. "Actually, we're foreign" a heavily-accented man said. "Oh, well do you happen to have any pins?" she continued. "No, but that guy usually does. You should chase him down," he told us. Glad to have permission to stalk someone, we hurried off after the man our foreign friend had been chatting with. After a few "excuse me!"s he turned around, as did the young guy he was with. We opened again by asking where in the US he was from (Lake Placid, NY) and then I asked the kid he was with "what's your sport?" (which feels a lot like asking "what's your sign?"). He was a luger! We talked to him for a little bit, and he handed Blaire one USA Luge pin - which I want! She said I could have it if she got another USA pin. Let's pray that she does! I had forgotten to look at his accreditation to get his name, but I checked on the Vancouver 2010 website and found out his name is Chris Mazdzer. I'm going to keep my eye out for him at the Sliding Center, because he said he was going to be around for the rest of the Games!

Chris Mazdzer's official photo for the Games