Olympic Adieu

Yesterday the games of the 30th Olympiad in London came to a close. As IOC President Jacques Rogge said, they were indeed "happy and glorious" and I thoroughly enjoyed them.

I wasn't particularly fond of the closing ceremonies - just not my style of music, I'm afraid, and to me fashion and models are a bit incongruous with the Olympics - but I certainly enjoyed watching many of the events. Coverage (at least in Canada) was superb; in the rare case I couldn't find something I wanted to see live on one of the five channels covering the games here, I could always catch it online using the CTV app or website.

Londoners truly did themselves proud and made their city a place I'd definitely like to visit some day too. Everything ran like clockwork - if an event was scheduled for 9 AM, it started then - and the literally thousands of volunteers always seemed to be smiling and pleasant. Regular glimpses of royalty (William, Kate and Harry were at many of the events) were a nice treat too. It was lovely to see the pride Great Britain had, and it was well justified. Not only were the games a huge success, so too were their athletes. They came in fourth in the medal count with 29 gold!

I was also glad the games came off safely; beforehand there were some concerns about security and I admit I was a little worried someone might try something. (I really need to be a lot more positive and optimistic and just trust that everything is going to be OK. It puts such a damper on things when you're always fearful.) It was so good to see the world coming together, being happy and fair for at least a few weeks.

There were so many heartwarming stories too. There's Oscar Pistorious, the double amputee who nonetheless ran (and well) for South Africa. There's Jamaica's Usain Bolt who won the "triple double" or "double triple" depending on how you want to say it: the 100m, 200m, and 4x100m gold medals in both the 2008 and 2012 Olympics and has to be the greatest runner - at least the greatest sprinter - of all time.

And there were several stories from the pool: Michael Phelps - the greatest swimmer of all time - ended his career with an additional four gold and two silver medals for an astonishing total of 22 Olympic medals ... 18 golden! In men's diving, our own Alexandre Despatie competed despite smashing his head on the board in training only a month or so before the games. Two other young divers might not have been there at all. Three years ago Britain's Chris Mears ruptured his spleen in a diving competition, lost five pints of blood and was given only a five percent chance of surviving - let alone diving. And Australia's Ethan Warren had a serious heart infection just last year and wasn't sure he'd ever be able to dive again. None of these three won medals, but they all made the event finals and exemplify what the games are all about - just going out there and doing your best. In my book that definitely makes them all - just like the games - winners.