Miranda
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Showing posts tagged Headstart2012
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Dervis Konuralp
Ok. It’s fair to say that training atleast 5 hours a day from the age of 9, watching what you eat and finding time to do school work is something that is extremely hard. Well, Dervis Konuralp- a paralympian swimmer has been doing all of this from the age of 9. Meeting Dervis on friday night was quite inspirational. He spoke of his disability and then went onto explain all the things he’s achieved, for example winning 14 Gold medals, 15 Silver and 6 Bronze. Hearing all the things he’s done, even with a disability, made me feel somewhat lazy-I mean he’s dealt with obstacles all his life and overcome them. It got me thinking that whenever an opportunity arises in life I will grasp it and I guess that’s what he hopes people will get from his powerful speeches. I guess he hopes to inspire.
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Charlie Tims
Speaking to Charlie Tims has helped me a lot in terms of thinking about what I want to blog about. At the moment, having looked at his blog and listened to him speaking, I can see that his main focus for his blogs is the Olympics. He’s been posting pictures of places who’s names have the word ‘olympic’ in for example, ‘Olympic cafe’ and he has generally just been talking about the Olympics.
I like the fact that he hasn’t just traditionally talked about the Olympics like most people, for example he has taken the photo’s I just explained and he has even talked about the last consensus. I like that, because I want my blog to be different too, in fact I want it to be really creative, because I want it to be something people haven’t seen before.
So I think as I continue to write my blogs I will keep checking his for more inspiration.
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The coming Olympics
Ever since I started the Headstart 2012 project I seem to be hearing and seeing things about the coming Olympics EVERYWHERE. It seems that the 2012 Olympics is bigger than I had presumed- I mean obviously I knew it was huge, but I didn’t comprehend the effect it has over people.
An great example of the effect the Olympics is having on people is a BBC programme I watched the other day on the news channel. The programme followed some of the British athletes hoping to be a part of Olympics and they all seemed so optimistic and excited about it.
The programme sort of got me a bit excited, which is something I didn’t think I would get over the London Olympics.
I guess the Olympics bug is highly contageous!
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Charlie Tims’ Wordpress blog
In response to Charlies blog:
Charlie’s blog seems very researched and detailed. His questions are well thought out and they make you actually think-which is something that doesn’t seem to be happening a lot any more. I like the fact that he writes creative questions, not just the obvious, ’ Do you enjoy the Olympics’, instead he writes stuff like, ’ How does the Olympics celebrate beauty in films, ceremonies, photography and design?’. This question can lead you down so many paths trying to answer it, you research all Olympic commissioned films in the past, all Olympic ceremonies caught on tape and many other things.
Unfortunately, I didn’t look at his blog before I made my piece about the Olympics, because if I had I would have stolen some his great questions, but I’m definately going to research into his questions further!
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Our Olympic Park tour on the 23 February
On the 23rd, along with my fellow headstarters and equipped with a flip cam, I got into an Olympic park tour bus- not knowing what to expect.
We spent about an hour going round the park and I just have to say, I had no idea that the park was so big! To be honest, I have been thinking about the Olympics and what it means to people, the legacy of the coming games, etcetera, but I haven’t thought much about how everything is being constructed for it and why. I feel silly really looking back on my previous naiveities’, because how else did I think the London games will happen.
I saw the stadiums and buildings that are still in development(but are really coming on), the projects that have been finished and it actually dawned on me for the first time that the Olympic games are only around a year away- amazing!
I’m not known for getting excited about the Olympics, but hearing how near enough everything in the Olympic park is going to be used after to benefit the community, I found that I had sort of become excited, but let me not get too carried away with my giddiness, because we have yet to see if the promise of regeneration and sustainability will be followed through with.
Pictures and videos of the tour will be coming up soon…
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Shedspace on Sunday
Yesterday (Sunday 24 July) a few of us head starters went down to the Stratford rising Shedspace festival, which is an amazingly well thought up idea. Dozens of actual sheds were dotted around Stratford, each doing there own thing-from one being a mini nightclub to a circus shed.
Our shed was focussed on the Olympics and we, as social media journalists, were stopping people and asking them about their feelings towards the Olympics. We asked them questions on whether they’d received tickets and many more. It was really exciting to hear how many of the Stratford locals felt about the coming Olympics and although some had a few issues with it, for example the fact that it was bringing travel disruptions, most seemed optimistic.
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Just a bit of daily news…
Apparently the Olympic torch is going to be abseiled off the roof of Croke Park, a stadium in Dublin. Its supposed to be the highlight of the torches visit to Dublin and it got me wondering, what are other parts of the country going to do to mark this highlight in the build up to the games?
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An unlikely weightlifter
Hannah Powell, who at just eighteen years of age is aiming for gold in the London Olympics.
It’s quite refreshing to see a young girl, who apparently got into weightlifting when she was only 11 (her uncle and dad used to be weightlifters), being marked out as an Olympic contender. It just shows youth that once they’ve put their mind to something, nine times out of ten they can achieve it.
What I find quite inspiring is that Hannah is clearly an attractive young lady, so she probably got some stick about doing something which is quite man orientated, but the fact she stuck with it really shows that she’s shown great commitment for something she likes.
I just wish you’d hear more stories like this, not always the negative stuff on the news and I also wish that you got to hear more about the events which aren’t necessarily publicised as much.
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Wow!
Ive just seen that the security budget for the Olympic games is £2 billion, now its a tricky one to call, as London is always under threat for something or other, whether thats terrorism or something else, but can we really afford to be spending that much money?
America are behind this budget 100%, supposedly being sceptical of the UK’s anti-terrorism powers. They are planning to send FBI officials and some diplomatic security services members along too to make sure the American athletes are kept safe.
It seems its all hands on deck in the lead up to the London 2012 olympics.
