Live from Athens... it's Bob and Bert!

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|| SportsShooter.com: News Item: Posted 2004-08-06

Live from Athens... it's Bob and Bert!
Deutsch and Hanashiro have been in Greece for almost a week and they are enjoying their stay.

By Robert Hanashiro, Sports Shooter

Photo by Robert Hanashiro / USA TODAY

Bob Deutsch, left, and Robert Hanashiro are happy to be in Athens as they prepare for the Oplympic games.

Yasou!

Greetings from Athens, Greece.

It's one week until the Opening Ceremonies and after a few days here in Greece, I thought I'd pass along some thoughts and observations along with some advice to those heading here in the next few days.

The new Athens International Airport at Spata, which opened in March of 2001, is a modern facility that is bright and spacious and is comparable to most airports in large cities in the U.S.

One word of caution if you're flying here connecting through another country, like Germany: Be prepared for the possibility that some or all of your baggage will be delayed. Out of our party of 4 from USA TODAY traveling this past Monday, three of us had bags delayed and my colleague Bob Deutsch had all four of his bags not arrive with him.

There is a lost baggage counter located very conveniently in the baggage carousal area and the people there are helpful, speak English and try to be comforting. Make sure you have as much info about where you will be staying in Athens to give to them if you have a lost bag. The name of the hotel or media village and a telephone number if you have it.

After our check-in at the Maroussi Media Village 1, we informed the people there of our lost bags and they made calls to the airport to confirm things for us. Our wayward bags arrived at our media village sometime around 4 am - so be warned: When bags arrive at security at the media village, they will want you there personally to identify they are yours before they are screened.

Our transport via shuttle bus from the airport to the media village was something akin to "Mister Toad's Wild Ride" despite being directed to board a bus labeled with the name of our media village, we were dropped off over half a mile away because apparently our bus driver didn't feel like taking us there!

But No Worries - several Athens Oly Volunteers descended upon us and found a couple of private automobiles to take us the rest of the way.

The personnel at the media village are all very friendly and are very, very helpful.

This is one thing we have noticed during our first few days here: All of the Olympic Volunteers have been cheery and as helpful as they can be. A smile and "How can I help you?" certainly is a comfort after traveling for 12 hours.

Photo by Robert Hanashiro / USA TODAY

Bob Deutsch awaits word on his lost bags at the reception desk at Maroussi Media Village 1.

There are a few things that have been less than perfect however, the first being that a lot of organizations have found their personnel scattered around the media village verses being placed in the same apartment - or for that matter, the same building.

Our apartment has 6 bedrooms, 3 singles and 2 doubles, but instead of having all USA TODAY staff living here, we are sharing the space with journalists from Japan and Great Britain. This makes storing and sharing gear among our staff a lot more difficult.

Also the Maroussi Media Village 1 has no restaurant or bar on site - both were listed in the accommodations info. So if we want dinner after a long day of covering The Games, we'll have to walk about 3/4 of a mile to get a decent meal or an adult beverage.

As a matter of fact, I am embarrassed to say that our first meal in Athens had to be at "Goodys" a local fast food outlet about a 20-minute walk from Maroussi 1. (Hey, I had a Greek salad!)

Also Olympic veterans will find that just about everything is scaled back - like the small press conference room in the MPC to workrooms to the apartment showers to even elevators.

And speaking of elevators, Bob Condron from the USOC told us a funny a story our first day here about recent arrivals from his group. They got into an elevator to get to the USOC office at the MPC and ended up stuck in it! After figuring out that the elevator had stopped and the door wouldn't open they looked for the emergency alarm and there wasn't one - and when they opened the door to the emergency phone, they discovered just two bare wires! Fortunately someone had a cellphone and called Bob who came to their rescue with a maintainence worker with a crowbar to open the door!

The Main Press Center (MPC) is another curiosity - a maze of several buildings each with several floors and no simple way to get to the ground floor to our offices on the 3rd floor. For instance in the front part of the MPC there is an up escalator, but no down escalator.

For photographers, finding the Kodak Imaging Center where Nikon and Canon are located will be challenge if you don't know where you're going.

Signage is a bit sparse, and ones that are up can be confusing. We finally asked a volunteer to show us where Kodak is located and she promptly walked us to a print kiosk in the gift store!

We finally discovered Kodak, Nikon and Canon in the bowels of the MPC, in the basement.

Photo by Robert Hanashiro / USA TODAY

USA TODAY's Bob Deutsch sits on a shuttle bus to the Main Press Center in Athens.

While the MPC admittedly is small (compared to previous Summer Olympics), confusing and spartan, it is located right next door to a HUGE multi-story department store, Carrefour. This store has a supermarket for food and drink (yes Bob was able to get his Scotch!) but also appliances, DVDs/CDs (in Greek), clothing, shoes, office supplies, automotive and household items.

Heck, the AP's Mark Terrill didn't have to pack clothes for 30 days like he told me he wanted to do - he could have just bought socks and underwear at Carrefour.

The only warning about shopping at any outside store - if you are bringing it back to the MPC make sure to have a plain bag, backpack or even an Athens Olympic bag to put the items in before entering the building. Because of sponsorship deals they won't allow bags from non-sponsor companies.

Several people heading to Athens contacted me during the past couple of months asking about preparing for this adventure. Several mentioned actually shipping food and items like Power Bars over here.

People: This is NOT a third world country! You can buy just about everything here you can in the Good Ol' U S A (well, maybe everything except a replacement power supply for an Apple G4 desktop!). Don't waste your baggage space with things like snacks, "energy bars", extra clothing and the like. Just buy it here.

However there are a few things that you might think about bringing with you. If you're a Mac user things like backup laptop AC power supplies, connectors, adaptors and other do-dads that we would normally head to Fry's Electronics to pick up might be difficult to find here.

Also the little European AC plug adapters have been difficult to find here so hit Radio Shack or Fry's to get a few before getting on your flight to Athens.

Photo by Robert Hanashiro / USA TODAY

Bob Deutsch waits for a media shuttle bus in front of the Maroussi 1 Media Village.

We haven't made it out to all of the competition venues and access to some, especially in the Olympic Circle near the MPC has been limited up to now.

A trip out to some of the outlaying venues --- like kayaking, softball and beach volleyball has shown us that they are very, very nice and in some ways spectacular. Beach volleyball and weightlifting have never seen venues as nice as the ones they are in here in Athens for instance.

Venue and photo chiefs we have met here have all been very friendly and have gone out of their way to be helpful.

But as I said, we haven't been inside yet to look at track & field, swimming, gymnastics and basketball the "Big Four" events.

To say the least, transportation at these games will be a little frustrating. But they are at most Olympic Games.

I took the Olympic Media Shuttle system out to the Faliro Olympic Complex to photograph a feature at the Beach Volleyball Complex.

I think the most confusing thing about the shuttle system is they are using "hubs" so to get to most of the venues, it's a two-bus hop.

For instance for me to get to Beach Volleyball, I had to go walk out of the MPC and go to the IBC to the hub there. Then it was a 25-minute bus ride out to the Faliro Hub. From there it would have been another bus ride to the venue - if buses were operating. Because it's so early, buses now are only running to the transportation hubs, but not from there to the individual venues. So I had about a 1/2 mile walk from the Faliro Hub to my shoot at Beach Volleyball.

If you're not like the Sports Illustrated guys and have your own car and driver, make sure to pick up Media Transport Guide (a thick handbook with routes and maps) when you check in the first time into the MPC.

Photo by Robert Hanashiro / USA TODAY

USA TODAY's Bob Deutsch heads out of his apartment building on his way to the Main Press Center in Athens.

One good thing is that the Olympic Lanes on the streets and highways of Athens have worked great. So far.

We finally got out on the town for a nice dinner in a traditional Greek restaurant Thursday night, courtesy of a good friend of USA TODAY Olympic Picture Editor Michael Madrid. The eggplant appetizer was yummy, the lamb excellent and the ouzo cold and potent!

After going non-stop for a few days, a nice night out (at least outside of the MPC and a venue) was certainly welcome - as was the eight hours of sleep after the uozo!

If I am staying on the positive side during this article it is with a purpose. I think for me to survive this three week-plus ordeal I have to carry a positive attitude and keep looking on the bright side of things. I don't want to let frustration end up venting in anger (well, maybe just once or twice during the trip?) and I hate to see the "Ugly American" episodes that are inevitable during events like an Olympics.

Covering an Olympic Games often takes - well, an Olympian effort. So come here with hard work on your mind, expect long days but bring also a measure of good cheer and especially patience. Things and people here in Athens move at a different pace than most of us. Maybe borrowing the attitude of our hosts from the last Summer Games, the Aussies, is in order "No Worries Mate!"

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