Friday, September 16, 2016

A night to remember

Last practice of these games



It's really slowing down here. From our perspective (Canadians competing), the focus is on cycling road races, swimming and WC rugby. We still have sailing events but the sport is often forgotten because they are remote and not the best spectator sport. Our athletes are doing well though.

It makes the energy level decrease. At the clinic, the volume is decreasing as athletes are out of competitions. Medically, we are still quiet...knock on wood.

I have had more time off than any other games. Although I stay in clinic and am here to see anyone who requests a physician, it is not busy so I still call it "time off". It's not the same as having the luxury of touring around, going to the beach, etc. I have done none of that yet.

I did recommend to the women's WCBB staff to get out of the village for dinner as we are all getting quite tired of the sining hall. They have had no variety for the whole duration....There is a nice hotel, the Grand Mercure, right outside the Village and I heard there is a nice restaurant in there. So to get it organized, I had our team attaché for the basketball team, Julianna, call them for a reservation. She got it all done. 5 People for 7:30. She said she made sure there was no special events and they had room for us. Everything was all good...
So we get all dressed up (not really) and head to the hotel which is about a 15 minute walk. The lobby is busy wit a nice bar where some people are having drinks and some bar food. We head upstairs to the restaurant. This is where we get suspicious. There are many signs for the "IPC Hospitality " event of some kind and many other signs for what appears to be a Team France sponsored event. We are told we cannot enter as there is a special event. Although we mention we have reservations, we are shut down. We decide we aren't going to win this battle and head to the lobby bar and will get dinner there. We tried calling Julianna to see what was actually happening as the language barrier was challenging. We enjoyed a nice round of caipirinhas, the traditional Brazilian drink. Then the Maitre D' from upstairs comes down and tells us Julianna called him and he apologizes and tells us they can accommodate us at 9 and we can get a complimentary round of caipirinhas. We don't know what happened but, oh well, free drinks and we decide to wait. At 9 we go upstairs and a different person meets us. Same message: you cannot come due to a special event. We try explaining we have just been told we could come at 9...falls on deaf ears. Now we are really hungry and, after these strong drinks decide to go back for the bar and actually order food. The lady who we just met upstairs comes down and tells us they can accommodate us at 9:30 and would we accept another free round. At this point, it is becoming so silly we decide :"Why not". Finally, 3 rounds of quite strong drinks and over 2 hours after the original "reservation" was made, we head to the restaurant. It looks more like a large room, with an open terrace like feel, with a table set for a buffet. Quite simple and not what we expected. If there's food , we are fine with it. WE get the menus and order. Anyway, the evening continues and it's not until about 11 pm that we finally get the food on the table. Yes: 11 pm!! It wasn't even worth the wait. Certainly not the great dining experience we expected. So after 11:30, we are walking back to the Village wondering if over 4 hours of our evening was worth spending with this odd affair? We thought we could get a nice dining experience without complicated taxis to take us into Barra area which would have been over 30-45 minutes away. It would have been faster and much better dinner. We still had many laughs as the evening progressed so we decided it was worth the "experience" if to just to recollect this story in the future.

The previous evening had the men and women's WCBB team hosted at the Canada Paralympic House (CPH) where family and friends can celebrate the athletes. It was fun for the athletes to see their families in this setting. CPH exists at all Paralympics and is a point of centralization for all Canadians who have their sons or daughters competing. Their was much fanfare when the COC made a video of the Canada Olympic House available on youtube. CPH is not even close to that glamorous showcase. I guess the budget of the CPC is not the same as the COC. I wonder where those funds come from?
Mingling at CPH

Men and women WCBB team with family and friends

Jamey Jewells and Arinn Young with Arinn's parents


1 comment:

  1. You rock Dr.Goudie...they're lucky to have you on board and I'm sure you feel very blessed to be there. Great job to you and the girls xo

    ReplyDelete