Ramblin’ to Paris Pt. 14: Living the Olympic Games

I spent 5 days in Paris during the first week of the games, here’s how it went

For five days of the first week of the Paris Olympics, I got to experience what many of you here did in 1996, and maybe too at other Olympics – live in and watch the Games in person. It really is a one of a kind event when considering everything that goes into making this happen and how much it takes over a city. It’s absolutely worth doing at least once if given the chance. I imagine Paris regularly has a very diverse population strolling the streets given it’s tourism allure, but in the core areas last week, it really impressed upon me just how many different peoples one could come across in seconds just walking around. Mix in the fact this was Paris, the combo and magnitude of diversity + history + international sporting events happening at nearly all hours delivers a microcosm of humanity’s modern existence so rarely seen anywhere else.

The highlights I saw before I dig into the small details:

Alex Sedric’s walk-off try for the USA in the bronze medal women’s rugby match:

Spain women’s soccer dictating a sweltering, chippy match against Brazil where Marta cleated a player and was given a straight red card
Watching archery at Invalides; archers are so ridiculously skilled at what they do and that had to be one of the most scenic backdrops of any event ever (save for beach volleyball at the Eiffel Tower)
Getting to see field hockey properly played (I’ve spent many weekends watching amateur field hockey) with crisp passing and wicked fast shooting, plus was one of the only events we saw that we weren’t sweltering at.
Walking into so many centuries old cathedrals. They just don’t build ‘em like they used to (save for the Sagrada and rebuild of Notré Dame).
Not overly inflated food prices!

Day by day:

Me and my travelling party (my brother, his fiance, fiance’s friend) arrived in Paris the morning of July 29th after an overnight flight from New York that featured a layover in the Keflavik airport. We could see the Olympic rings on the Eiffel Tower as we landed at Charles de Gaulle.

From there it was a day full of exploring Paris, notably seeing works of some of the more famous modern artists in The Centre Pompidou, the construction at Notré Dame, and a first look at the Seine River (it did not look like people should be in it). Having spend the overwhelming majority of my days in car based cities, getting a full run on Paris’ metro system was fascinating and has me, like many, wishing we had something approaching that in Atlanta.

Day two was a full day in Saint-Denis, seeing the Basilica of Saint Denis (one of the first buildings prominently using Gothic architecture) and that part of the city before settling in for 5.5 hours of women’s rugby in Stade de France, which included seeing the U.S. twice in their semi-final and bronze medal matches. France played in a match during that session, which gave me my first experience of a home European crowd of any kind cheering for their squad. We may have our thunderous college football stadiums, but there is something unique to nationalistic pride in an athletic context for a country that’s existed far longer than any institution in the United States. We won’t reach those levels of fervor any time soon.

Day three we trained to Bordeaux and saw another basilica before going to the Nouveau Stade de Bordeaux of the now defunct FC Girondins de Bordeaux to see Spain and Brazil in women’s soccer.

Both the Nouveau Stade and Stade de France had very bland interiors. You could not find any signage that wasn’t either Olympic themed or a concessions menu. There was no trace of FC Girondins (although I assumed that all got wiped with the team losing professional status) in Bordeaux and Stade de France didn’t even have a poster or ad for the French National Team. It was just straight concrete or concessions until you got to a seat and could see the field. While it’s neat to see a clean stadium, it did seem a little lifeless with how sterile it was. Same went for concessions: everything was Coca-Cola products per their deal with the IOC. The most notable thing for us about the food inside was that the hot dogs weren’t on white bread buns like we’re used to.

Day three we made our way to Jardin du Luxembourg and Jardin Tulierie, the latter of which is where the Louvre and the Olympic Torch sat. There were plenty of spots to actually lay eyes on the torch, but to get close required a special ticket that only so many people got access to, meaning very few people were ever close to the torch at any given moment. In the evenings, they would raise it in the air given good weather, which drew Coachella level crowds to watch.

That evening was a visit to Stade Yves-du-Manoir (host of track and field and other sports at the 1924 Olympics) for women’s field hockey, where we saw the U.S. lose to Great Britain, granted it’s a sport the Americans have never dominated in. The only locations I’ve seen field hockey played are: Georgia Tech, Arizona Soccer Fields on Arizona Ave, and now here.

Finally, our final event the following morning was mixed archery at Hôtel des Invalides, easily one of the more scenic locations in the city.

While archery was the least entertaining sport to watch, it’s the sport where skill was impressed upon us the most because you could see just how precise the archers had to be. The picture gives a good impression of how far the archers shoot (70m) and how small the target is. It was a great place to start the day to as it was in walking distance to Concorde, Avenue des Champs-Élysées, and the Arc de Triomphe (which will be a focus during the Paralympic Games and already has the Paralympic logo adorning it). Our final stop in Paris was the most scenic view you can get in the city atop Monmartre at Sacré-Cœur:

Final impressions:

I get why they only do this every four years. The size and resources needed to pull this off as well as Paris did blows me away. I’ve helped run music festivals, beer festivals, gone to a million sports events and a bunch of other events in the past, and it’s hard to fully grasp just how much it takes to put this on. The entire city is on theme. Nobody has anything else going on, it’s just the Olympics 24/7. Of all cities to possibly have enough going on to make it feel like the Olympics aren’t also happening, Paris would be one of those cities, but I never really got that feeling.

While I’ve only done this Olympics, Paris absolutely feels like a place the IOC should put on a rota to host if they ever decides to go that route. They pulled these games off at such a high level, the crowds were amazing, the sports were enthralling, and they have the space if more sports make the permanent list. It was evident they had taken care enough of the little things to get the city ready without losing its charm (save for the many locals gone on holiday, but this is the usual time of year for them to do so). The city still felt actively lived in and not puffed up to make look good, because it already does look good.

We didn’t really have to dip into speaking French all that often, which I have to imagine is more a product of the highly international population on hand just to make things easier. We’d be wearing Team USA gear to cafés and such, and that was a glaring enough sign for locals to initiate conversation in English rather than French. I certainly was grateful for those instances, as the many wait staff folks we interacted with didn’t have to default to English, but they still did.

One thing that I was surprised to learn about myself is that a diversity of architecture matters to me! By the end of day two, I realized when it came to the average buildings of Paris, you actually could make an average because they all are five stories and stone. Very few buildings added a paint job or a splash of color save for Champs-Élysées or some restaurants. I never had any clue where I was without a map because to my untrained eye, everything looked the same. When we had a stopover in Iceland on the way back, I was emotionally relieved to finally see the color green again! This is not a gripe I take seriously, but if I ever move to a new city, I know I gotta see some diversity in the architecture of the area.

In terms of the sports, of course the United States had another fantastic showing winning a leading 126 medals, 13 more than Tokyo. We tied China with 40 golds after beating them by only one in Tokyo. I had no issue being a loud ass American during our matches, especially since we were usually outnumbered in the crowds by not being a local country. The ACC finished with 89 total medals, which would’ve put them two behind China for 2nd if they were a participating nation.

Georgia Tech does walk away with one medal as Julia Bergmann won bronze in women’s indoor volleyball for Brazil.

I’m glad to be back in Atlanta. I’m ready for football and volleyball season. This was one of the greatest trips I’ll ever take. Hopefully I’ll be right here writing more Ramblin’ to’s next time I’m headed to a major event like this.