Boiling Points

The media center is steadily becoming a madhouse! It's easy to understand the Olympics is a hotbed of pressure and exhaustion, but people deal with their frustration in different ways. Some of my new friends here manage to clock out for beers by 8 or 9PM every night, but for those of us who stay here until 10, 11, 2, or 1:45 (That's been my schedule the past four days) it's not that easy.

Not less than ten minutes ago two Chinese journalists got in a heated yelling match with three of our young, female volunteers. It got to the point where the middle-aged man pushed a girl and she and her peers ran away crying. He ran after, pushed past the girl who was trying to block the door, and all we heard was a lot of yelling and sneaker-squeaking.

Rewind to two days ago, when a photographer lambasted a volunteer in front of the whole media center and made her cry.

Now add the constant drone of the PA system, through which they use possibly the most words available in the English language to convey every message. Yesterday a famous journalist screamed at the sky "SHUT UP!" to vent some frustration against the intangible voice.

Now remember that many of these people are exhausted to the point at which they can't control their emotions, and that they are all working on deadlines with hundreds of requests.

In the midst of all this I'll admit I am catching a bit of the insanity, but I have luckily been sitting across from my cheery Croatian equivalent. We work the same hours and she's always smiling so I use her as an inspiration. It' becoming a bit of an animal farm here and we have to look out for each other.

Media Center at noon:

Media Center at midnight: