Celebration of the Olympic Truce During the XXX Games of the Olympiad
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14.4 Special 2012 Issue Arete WWW.IOAPA.ORG NEWSLETTER OF THE INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC ACADEMY PARTICIPANTS ASSOCIATION 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Editorial................................................................................................................3 Vagelis Alexandrakis President’s message............................................................................................4 Hector Arguelles The IOAPA Reunion in London............................................................................5-6 Carolin Bischop Reunion at the House of Hellenes........................................................................7 Vagelis Alexandrakis The Czech Olympic House ……………................................................................8-9 Daniel Taras Volunteering in Heineken House … ....................................................................10-11 Lea van Breukelen Covering the Olympics.........................................................................................12-13 Yoav Dubinsky My first time at the Olympics................................................................................14-15 Rita Nunes London 2012: from passion to fairy tail: my personal perspective(abridged).......16-17 John de Oliveira Social Legacies of the London Olympics..............................................................18-19 Vagelis Alexandrakis The IOA at the Pierre de Coubertin Symposium....................................................20 Anita Sterea Participants acclaim Disability sports: A vehicle for social change……….........................................................................................................21 Ian Brittain Celebration of the Olympic Truce during the XXX Games of the Olympiad.........22-24 Hugh Dugan Survey: Internationalism at the IOA......................................................................25 2 Editorial Dear Readers, Welcome to the Special Issue of the Arete Newsletter! On the occasion of the London Olympic Games, IOAPA releas- es a special issue of the Arete Newsletter, totally focused on the Olympic and Paralympic Games! Find out about the amazing IOAPA reunion on 3 August, the reunion organised by the IOA at the House of Hellenes on 2 August and read personal “Olympic” testimonies and first- hand experiences by IOAPA member who were actively pre- sent at the Olympics! You can also find some commentaries highlighting the social legacies of the London Olympics and the celebration of the Olympic Truce during the Games as well as an overview of con- ferences held during the Games! Last but not least, find out how you can participate in an in- teresting study about Internationalism at the IOA as well as in the IOAPA evaluation survey. Enjoy your reading! With Olympic regards, Vagelis Alexandrakis Arete Newsletter Editor 3 President’s Message By: Hector Arguelles (Spain) Dear Members, I would like to welcome you to this special edition of Arete dedicated to Lon- don 2012 Olympic Games. As you might realize there has been a change in the editorial. I would like to say a big thank you to Anne Warner from Cana- da who for the last three years has made a great contribution to the Arete Newsletter, upgrading its design and constantly improving the Newsletter. New professional responsibilities had made difficult for Anne to keep the time commitment to the IOAPA. Vagelis Alexandrakis who is also the IOAPA Secretary is now doubling his effort at the IOAPA Executive Committee. Vagelis has been appointed as Newsletter Editor for the rest of the current term until the next IOAPA Ses- sion in the summer of 2013. I think the quality of this edition speaks for itself. As you can see the Arete continues to be in great hands. A big thank you to Vagelis for stepping up and making the additional effort of designing and curating the Newsletter, on top of his current tasks at the IOAPA Committee. We enjoyed great Games in London and IOAPA members have been in- volved as usual in many areas of the organization. You will be able to enjoy reading different perspectives of the games from our members: from volun- teers, to journalists, from researchers to spectators, from peace advocates to NOC staff. Please remember to fill the IOAPA evaluation questionnaire. We have re- ceived a good number of valuable answers, but we would like to read from as many of you as possible in order to keep improving what the association is offering. You can fill the IOAPA evaluation at http://tuck.qualtrics.com/SE/? SID=SV_6RvtkgT8JuXnr4F Enjoy the reading, Hector Arguelles 4 The IOAPA Reunion in London By: Carolin Bischop (GER) In 2008 my IOA experience started and since then I met many great peo- ple from all over the world. The Olympic Games in London in August marked the perfect occasion to gather again with old and new IOAPA members at the official Reunion. It took place in London Campus of the Coventry University and was or- ganised by long-time IOAPA member Ian Brittain, who was able to get a big conference room in the university with an extraordinary catering (!). On August 3rd at 4pm around 100 former IOA-participants from all over the world gathered in London. It was great to see so many people from so many different countries meeting again after their experience at the IOA or meeting for the first time making new friends. There were IOA- participants from the very last Young Participants session 2012 as well as participants, who participated 20 or more years ago, like the amazing Laurel Brassey Iversen, who is one of the founders of the IOAPA and longtime president and who came all the way from Hawaii to experience the Olympics. Or Betz Hanley from the US, who many of you know from the Dance Workshop she used to lead for many years. The Reunion lasted from 4 to 8 pm and some even came for only 10 minutes to meet their friends, but had to go back to work either in their NOCs or as volunteers. For me personally the IOAPA Reunion was the main reason to go Lon- don. I really wanted to see my friends from the IOA. When you are at the IOA you meet so many great, interesting and inspiring people and you quickly become friends. Unfortunately, after the time of the session you have to go back to your country knowing that you might not see everyone 5 again. A reunion of IOA participants is of great importance as not only are you able to meet the friends from the session you attended, but also to get to know new people, who share the same experience with you and know what this experience can mean to you. After the official reunion ended, some of went out to a bar near the uni- versity to bring back also some Zorbas-experiences to their minds. ;-) A big THANK YOU to all of you who were able to attend the Reunion and especially to Ian Brittain who put a lot of effort and time to organize the event. I hope to see all of you again at the official IOAPA Session in summer next year in the beautiful premises of the International Olympic Acade- my!!! 6 Reunion at the House of Hellenes By: Vagelis Alexandrakis (GRE) Just one day before the official IOAPA reun- ion, on 2 August there was a great warming- up! The IOA, which was based on the House of Hellenes, took this wonderful initiative and organized for IOAPA members and past IOA participants in general a very nice gathering! About 40 past participants showed up and those of us who were there had the chance to meet the Dean and the President of the IOA, the great IOA staff and so many “Olympic friends”. Also, we had the chance to see a nice small theatrical play, with the for- mer Gold Olympian in gymnastics, Ioannis Melissanides, starring in it. We had such a great night that evening. We saw again our IOA friends, we met new ones, we had nice drinks and, all in all, a wonderful time!! Thanks IOA for organizing this!!! 7 The Czech Olympic House By: Daniel Taras (Czech Republic) After participating in the IOA Young Participants’s session 2011 I recently had another amazing Olympic experience: I worked as a volunteer for The Czech Olympic House (COH). But let´s start from the beginning! In Czech Olympic Magazin I saw an ad about hiring volunteers. So I tried my luck. I first had to write a motivation letter and, later, got an interview with the Head of volunteers at the Czech Olympic Committee Centre. Finally I was one from less than one hundred most lucky guys!! But as we were "just" volunteers for the COH we got almost no benefits. That means that we had to pay for our journey, transport in London, accomodation and partly also food. I couldn´t manage it without a big help of Niki Koutrou who offered me a free accomodation during the entire duration of the Olympics. Without her I couldn´t manage it. So thank You Niki one more time! Up to Vancouver 2010 the COH was only for sportsmen and people from NOCs. During the Vancouver Games, at a day when Czech Republic had won some medals, the Vice-Chairman of the Czech Olympic Committee invited a Dutch friend of his. This Dutch person thought that instead of seeing a celebration, the atmoshphere in the COH reminded him of a funeral. This is how the idea was conceived to make the COH more friendly, open for all Olympic visitors. After three years of hard work the final idea was born and The Islington Business Centre, located close to Angel metro station, was transformed to The COH. You couln´t miss that place. The COH had three main sections. In the first one you coud find a reception and a desk of Czech travel agencies. A few steps further there was a clothes store with the official Czech Olympic collection. (Maybe you remember the awesome (?) Wellington boots.) On the other side there was a court for streetball 3 on 3. By the way a sport which will be maybe seen soon in the Olympics programme. There were also competitions of Czech and British professionals in the mornings. In the afternoon there were public tournaments for Olympic tickets. The second section was on such a higher plateau. You could watch there live Olympic events from three big screens, try some fittness machines or rather Czech beer in bar, enjoy a big exhibition of pictures with sport subjects, play table football or be a part of life broadcasting from Czech Olympic TV Studio.