I’ve travelled the world to volunteer at Games to Malaysia, England and Australia. This time, there are Games in my backyard. My participation with the 2011 Canada Winter Games began almost 1½ years ago. I was recruited to be part of Mission Services planning by a friend who knows me through Common wealth Games. I’ve volunteered with Team Canada at that event three times, in communications and media relations. This time around, I’m part of a team of volunteers working with the mission staffs that run the 13 local and territorial teams that will struggle here.
Each delegation, led by a chef de mission, has an office in the World Trade and Convention Centre. The athletes’ village is also partly situated in the trade centre, so it will be a hub of Games activity. Our volunteers will be right in the thick of it, answering phone calls and questions from mission staff, booking meeting rooms and doing photocopying, among other tasks. Being involved in Canada Games has given me a possibility to reconnect with volunteers and mission staff I’ve worked with before. I’m also enjoying meeting new people from Halifax, around Nova Scotia and across Canada.
Multi-sport games are a funny thing: they get in your blood and become addictive. There are volunteers who routinely travel around the world to be part of various Games. I’m working with Canada Games volunteers, for instance, who were involved in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. Go to Sherbrooke, Que., four years from now for the next Canada Winter Games and you will meet people who were in Halifax this February. The same faces also crop up at big events because the sport community in Canada is a close-knit one, particularly in a small province like Nova Scotia. Many volunteers have been involved in their sport for years and have a ton of experience locally, nationally and globally.
Each delegation, led by a chef de mission, has an office in the World Trade and Convention Centre. The athletes’ village is also partly situated in the trade centre, so it will be a hub of Games activity. Our volunteers will be right in the thick of it, answering phone calls and questions from mission staff, booking meeting rooms and doing photocopying, among other tasks. Being involved in Canada Games has given me a possibility to reconnect with volunteers and mission staff I’ve worked with before. I’m also enjoying meeting new people from Halifax, around Nova Scotia and across Canada.
Multi-sport games are a funny thing: they get in your blood and become addictive. There are volunteers who routinely travel around the world to be part of various Games. I’m working with Canada Games volunteers, for instance, who were involved in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. Go to Sherbrooke, Que., four years from now for the next Canada Winter Games and you will meet people who were in Halifax this February. The same faces also crop up at big events because the sport community in Canada is a close-knit one, particularly in a small province like Nova Scotia. Many volunteers have been involved in their sport for years and have a ton of experience locally, nationally and globally.
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