Sea Olympics - Sunday, March 7, 2010 - I know I am still missing days!

Since yesterday was the Sea Olympics, I will talk a little about that before Hong Kong. I know this makes everything chronologically out of order but for my sake it is just easier to talk about that day first. The Sea Olympics is a day of fun!!! There are no classes and everyone participates in events from morning to evening. The amazing part of this day is that it was the ultimate community builder. There was something for everyone to do from sports type stuff like tug o war and dodge ball to performances like lip synch and synchronized swimming and then silly events including hula hoops and extreme musical chair, there was also a trivia event for those who wanted to exercise their brains and of course the faculty team won that one!! My team came in 3rd overall but were most excited in their first place victory in the lip sync which they did an amazing dance to Thriller. I was most excited for them to win the most Spirited Sea. This is what my Sea won the first time I sailed too!! So yeah…I got SPIRIT!!!!

I saw groups of students who would not normally hang out plan performances and cheer each other on in the most positive way. It was a great coming together of people that ended with a BBQ which made everyone happy. This was one of my big (if not my biggest) event that I will do as part of my position and with the exception of a few hiccups throughout the day it went off very well. I attribute this to the great student group I was working with as well as the help and support I got from the rest of my Student Life team. It was truly a special day. I got to do the closing ceremonies and announce the winners of some of the bigger events and the overall winners. As most of you know public speaking is not my favorite thing to do, but it was one of my shining moments; I was a little bit emotional and a little bit funny and was able to speak to how proud I was of the students who made this day what it was. It is interesting today to hear everyone thank me for the day and I think that really shows how needed it was. It seemed to be that everyone was in this funk or lull and yesterday helped in bringing people out of it and gave them (especially the students) the energy to keep up all of the work they are doing (because they are working hard). I received an email today from a student (someone I do not know very well), “I just wanted to personally thank you for putting on a great day and an amazing sea Olympics yesterday. It made an everlasting memory and everyone I talked to agreed.” I know it is not much but it will go in my ‘why I do what I do’ file when I get home.

I do not really have any pictures to share right now because I was so busy running around all day, but when I get some I will add to this post.