Olympics

Experience of a lifetime

(China Daily)
Updated: 2011-06-01 08:30

BYLINE | MATT HODGES

I couldn't swing a ticket for the curtain-raiser of the 2008 Beijing Games, so I ended up watching it on two giant outdoor screens inside the Olympic Village, along with hundreds of others who also did not make it to the "Bird's Nest" National Stadium that night.

As the smoke from the fireworks clouded the night sky, I felt that my vantage point was a decent consolation prize, but I was determined not to miss out on the Zhang Yimou-directed closing ceremony.

Sixteen days later, one hour before the show was due to start, I received a call from a liaison officer with the International Olympic Committee. My heart was racing. "It's your lucky day," he said. "I've got one left. Better come to my office pronto."

One hour later, I was sitting inside the Bird's Nest next to a good friend of mine, Getty photographer Chris Hyde, reflecting on what had been, truly, the experience of a lifetime. On our laps sat goody bags of lights and paper, part of Zhang's plan to make the experience more visually dynamic for the global TV audience.

I had met or interviewed many of the stars of the Games, from Usain Bolt to Roger Federer to Yao Ming. Federer, one of the nicest guys I have met, picked up his first Olympic medal in three attempts. He told me he felt like he was turning a new corner in his career after a run of bad luck. Brazilian soccer legend Pele gave me a bear hug next to the Peace Wall.

China Daily had hired me 18 months earlier from South Korea, where I was AP's go-to sports stringer and an editor for Yonhap News Agency, to cover the build-up to the Games. As the Games approached, I was seconded to the Olympic Village to help organize Village Life, the trilingual daily newspaper for athletes and officials. I also filed stories back to the Beijing headquarters.

This put me in the privileged position of being the only foreign reporter based inside, and granted full access to, the Olympic Village, a place I had never imagined I would be.

Seven years earlier, when Beijing was awarded the rights to host the Olympic Games, I was working at a TV post-production house in Soho, London, preparing to move to South Korea to teach English.

During the Games, I got to race around the Olympic Village on US bronze medalist Donny Robinson's BMX, as well as chat to San Antonio Spurs' swingman Manu Ginobili inside the Argentina residence. Probably my biggest disappointment was when javelin thrower Leryn Franco, runner-up at the 2006 Miss Paraguay beauty pageant, told me she would have worn a swimsuit for our interview if I had asked her earlier.

I got to stick a microphone in Kobe Bryant's face, and discovered he is much friendlier than the media was making out at the time. As his IOC bodyguard tried to shove me out of the way, Kobe elbowed him aside and chatted with me about the US team's prospects. When I told him I was British, he said: "So is David (Beckham) coming?" If only Becks and I were on such good terms.

As I sat in the Bird's Nest at the end of it all, I reflected on what a long journey it had been, and how fortunate I was to have secured enough guanxi with the IOC to bag a free ticket to the finale.

Matt Hodges is a senior writer with China Daily.

(China Daily 06/01/2011 page61)