Day 1 - Arrival

My place of residence, "The Drums"

My Room

Pre-Team Processing

I woke up today and it hit me, "The day is finally here!"  Typically, just like any trip I ever prepare for I basically had nothing in my suitcase on the morning of departure.  With a few hours of sleep I threw everything together (and did quite well I may add) and headed to the airport.  Colorado Springs --> Chicago --> London  There was a group of about 12-15 of us arriving today in the first main wave of Team USA staff.  We arrived in London somewhere around 6 AM.
The moment felt somewhat similar to when I arrived in Auckland, New Zealand 7 years ago (Wow! I can't believe it's been that long).  I was in a big group again, boarded a similar bus, it was about the same time in the morning, there was an overcast with some rain here and there, and we were driving on the left side.  O and the part about starting the day quite tired!  It was a bit of a drive through the city to the first stop where part of the team was staying.  We drove by Olympic Stadium and the Athletes' Village on the way.  I think this is when it hit me that I was officially in London and the Olympics were near.  It was surreal to see the places with my own eyes rather than the screensavers at work for the past 2 years.  The bus then brought the rest of the group to University of East London-Docklands.  This is where I would be staying for the next 5 weeks.  The buildings we are staying in are quite unique.  They are called drums and the rooms are called pods.  They remind me of some housing off something like Dr. Seuss or Mario (check out the pictures in the slideshow).  The rooms are quite quaint  but I actually really like them.  I have my own room and it has bathroom!  I'm excited about the campus.  Everything is very convenient and I can't wait to see what the Sports Docks (gyms and all) look like later.  After lunch a group of us headed up to Sarah Bonnell School to put down a carpet flooring for Team Processing.  SBS is located near Olympic Park and where we had dropped the group off earlier at the Marlin. Team Processing is where the athletes come in and get their apparel and get fitted for all their gear.  Staff will be doing a 'dummy' run through there next week before athletes arrive. I'm very confident in how that will go because of who is in charge (Katie, I thought I'd give you a shout-out ;)).  She is my former supervisor and great at what she does.  The area by SBS is very busy and there are double decker buses everywhere.  Remember to look right!  Don't tell my mom that I nearly became a bug on one of their windshields! After a pitstop at the grocery store the group headed back to UEL on the light rail.  It was quite a long day and I think I passed out around 6:30-7:00 due to the time change.  Day 1 is a wrap!
 

Days left until Olympic Games: 18