Thursday, October 21, 2010

Commonwealth journey through my eyes

At the beginning of the blog i would like to clarify to each one out there that i did not volunteer for Commonwealth Games for so-called " NATIONAL PRIDE ",a term i believe invented by politicians for their own convenience .I did it for ISHQ-E-DILLI.I did it because i felt it was pay-back time to my beloved city Delhi which has given everything to grow into a sane person(though i never liked sane people because its boring to be one and being crazy was always fun and different ).


I dont exactly remember how all this started and from where exactly i heard about the volunteer programme but as soon i heard about it i knew i had to do it but i never knew at that time it would be such a long process before i finally got the accreditation card which certified me as a CWG Volunteer ,a part of Delhi United team (in spirit and in action) and would leave me with an enriching experience with some really priceless moments , beautiful friendships , a few interesting tales about the biggest sports event in the country till date, and above all a satisfying smile and contented heart when i left the Siri Fort Sports Complex (my venue) one last time around 4 pm on 14th October 2010 .

Though i remember filling the form for it through College as a part of NSS but never got any response about my form or confirmation that they received or just any information.So, the facebookalcoholic in me decided to take out some from my status,photo updates and chit-chat on the net to fill the huge form which wanted to know everything from the day i was born to my existence till that day .An over-stretched and boring online form of atleast 5 pages (i guess it was longer than the standard passport form we fill) and while filling the form i discovered a lot of details about myself (self-discovery u know).And the form refused to accept my mobile number to contact me though i took my dad's number in a second for emergency purposes.


Then the journey of Commonwealth Games began for me.Got an interview call on my mail.Went to the Organising Committee ,CWG Delhi 2010 Headquarters situated at Jai Singh Road opposite Jantar Mantar just to find out that another fairly long form was waiting for me asking the same old details(such a waste of paper though these games were green games and they were supposed to save paper) that i had filled in the online form atleast 20 times before and the twist in the tale was they never asked to bring any photographs so the first task was to find a shop which can provide me with some instant photographs so the search was on.Finally found a shop primarily an electronics shop but he took advantage of the fact this his shop was located near the OC office which never believed in giving information to people and i guess taken up photography as a side-business(he was earning loads of money as most of the volunteers came to him to get their pictures clicked).With some real bad pictures ( i hate instant pictures ) completed filling another confusing form(i forgot to mention the online form was equally confusing in some areas)and finally i was allowed to enter the building (which had nice structure but whats' with weird colours they had painted on it) .Waited for a few minutes and then my name was called for the interview ,the question were very basic and easy and to answer them i didn't had to use my brains just common sense and presence of mind was required most of them dealt with handling emergencies .

On Sunday afternoon when i was enjoying my sweet sleep got a call on my dad's mobile(as there website failed to take my number ) informing me that i was selected as a volunteer at that i didn't feel anything and went back to my dream world.But while chatting with someone , i discovered after almost two months that a lot people were rejected (i thought everybody got selected) and then i felt good.Then began a series of boring and pakao(waste of energy,time and money ) trainings which i believed didn't help any one of us ,though general training was far better than the other two most enjoyable of them and most tolerable as well as they were the only people which made sense.

Now its been the longest blog till date i have written .And i think for my experiences at the various training sessions and the those 10 days when i actually contributed towards delivering the best commonwealth games ever i need two more blogs.so to be continued.And May God be with you till we meet again.






1 comment:

  1. Finally got to know how a volunteer's real experience was!So well put!
    Write more so i can know more! :D

    ReplyDelete

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A journalism Student with specific interests in Politics and Sports.