World Special Olympics 2009

Last week was one of the most fulfilling weeks of my life. It was hectic and busy, gruesome, tiring and yet so amazing. When I think about the friends I made, the people I met and the experiences I had, I can't believe I was here at this time. Everything happens for a reason and I was reminded of that again as I went throughout the week.

I met my documentary partner Wendy this day (she is on exchange at BSU from London), and we immediately made friends with the Puerto Rican team. They loved that we had blue eyes but, there was a language barrier so no dates came out of it. :) I would point to their team name on the schedule of events and they would say Si! Si! Si! It was a lot of fun!

A nine year old from Team Afghanistan (their youngest player was 8, their oldest 14).

Wendy and Santi. Editing friends! This was after about 6 hours of editing and probably around 11 PM. (Note: Wendy wasn't really dead :))

I was a shooter and an editor for Floor Hockey. I spent five days at the Idaho Expo Center watching hundreds of athletes compete in one of the most intense games I have ever seen. I hadn't ever seen this sport played before, and after five days of body checks and board-bashing, I know that any of these athletes could kick my trash.

Jordan V. Mexico

Team Canada takes on Team Jamaica. Canada ended up winning one of the Gold Medals.

This athlete from Jordan followed Wendy and I around for a while. I think the only word he knew in English was "Hi." So, he said that a lot to us and we showed him out to use our camera, and had some fun interactions with him. Here he is mocking and making fun of Wendy. :)

It was incredible for me to see the amount of volunteer work that the people of Boise did. Over 5,000 people signed up to give a little bit of their time to these events. It was tiresome, but there was a lot of smiles, fun and I honestly haven't seen so much positivity in one setting in my entire life.

Some Volunteers made these snowmen the morning after a great snow. A large number of the athletes had never seen snow before, and they really enjoyed it. And yes, there was a massive snowball fight.

Another Puerto Rican friend. And a glimpse of our camera in the background behind his head. Because yes, we did do work.

That is Joe Biden in between me and campus. You can see him waving in the back seat. I was walking from my apartment to go edit and saw his parade of officials as I left my backyard. :)

The Closing Ceremony. It was a really emotional and amazing thing to be part of this ceremony. It made me sad that I wasn't able to go to the Opening Ceremony, but I was fortunate enough to be handed a ticket to this event.

Read this article to see one of the amazing things that I was able to witness at the Closing Ceremony.
http://www.specialolympics.org/wgu_be_a_fan_courage.aspx

The Special Olympics is an incredible thing to be part of. I learned so much technically and gained great experience for a future career. I will post videos I edited and filmed at a later point. More importantly however I learned however why the Special Olympics are such an amazing cause and organization. As of right now I plan on continuing to stay involved with SO. I don't know where I will be or what I will be doing but hopefully in 2011 I can be part of the Summer games in Athens, Greece. The Special Olympics motto is something I learned during my week volunteering. I believe it is applicable to not only athletes and participants in the Special Olympics but it is a motto that people can take with them in all their successes in life.

"Let me win, but if I cannot win, let me be brave in the attempt."

Do Not Bend.

I found this post I had forgot to put up for your enjoyment!

On Friday, July 25th, I got home from work opened the mailbox and was FIRED up to say the least. Inside was the typical junk that we receive but folded up and shoved inside was my diploma from Weber.







Clearly it is marked, DIPLOMA DO NOT BEND. Normally I am pretty forgiving when it comes to people doing dumb things. But I came inside and immediately called the USPS. I explained exactly what happend, received an apology and they told me the local post office would be contacted and I would be hearing from them.



I got home from the store a few days later and listened to this message:





Clearly I was not the first person to complain about this particular deliverer, and I am glad that the problem was taken care of. I do feel a little bit bad that this person in essence lost their job. But, if you can't perform your duties correctly, maybe you should find another duty.



There was one crease left in the diploma but, I'll deal with that later. This marks the end of my education at The Weebs.

Tagged By A Sister.

So this is a picture of me at the Newseum in DC. My parents and I went there this last August and spent quite a few hours there. Because I have a great interest in radio broadcasting, we thought it would be appropriate for me to pose nicely in front of the radio/birth of broadcasting sign. As a whole, the Newseum is probably my new favorite place downtown. There is so many things to read about, listen to, watch and participate in. It is a little pricey to get in, but I think that with everything that is available to see and experience, it is definitely worth spending time there. To fully appreciate everything I think you'd have to make mulitple visits but definitely plan on spending no less than 4 hours there if you want to try it out!
I don't know very many people with blogs and I feel like everyone I know has already been tagged so, I won't be passing along the favor! :)

Dizzy Busy.

50 years from now if I think about a crazy time in my life, a time where I was so occupied with (in no particular order) school, work, church, friends, bills and just general planning, I think the first time I will remember being that crazy and intense will be the last few weeks that I've experienced. The semester is going extremely well. I love my classes, my internship, the opportunities I have and everything that is surrounding me; I am just too tired to even begin to think about anything else.

Along with that tiredness however is the knowledge that I am prioritizing properly. Right now for instance I am beyond being tired and I am on the verge of hibernation. I have been up since 4:30 AM but, I was fortunate enough to be able to go to the Boise Temple at that time.


Getting to the Temple before the sun was up and leaving before it was up was something I haven't ever experienced before. But even with my tiredness 13 hours later, it was well worth it. I am busy, life is hectic and crazy in every sense, but I am happier than I've been in a long time. It isn't much by way of posts but hopefully you'll excuse my long absence from blogging. I am keeping up with everyone's blogs via my iPod on breaks between classes and have enjoyed pictures and posts alike. I will sum up my life in a more detailed post in the weeks to come. Miss you all!

Internship and More.

Well, it is official. When I return to school after the Christmas Break I will be interning at 103.3 in Boise. I am definitely excited to finally be working in radio. Hopefully after 150 hours of unpaid working, I will be decided on a career path.



The 7th-13th of February, Boise will be hosting the World Special Olympics and I will be helping with the filming and editing of video during the week. I'm excited and looking forward to being apart of this once in a lifetime opportunity. Footage will be available on SpecialOlympics.Org for parents of athletes to be able to view if they were not available to travel to the games.