People no less significant than VANOC CEO John Furlong and Prime Minister Stephen Harper praised the 25,000 sky-blue-clad “Smurf” volunteers as arguably the real heroes of the XXI Winter Olympic Games; they made the Vancouver 2010 Games tick. Indeed, the journey to be an Olympic volunteer had its own requisite training and endurance.

Barbara Ellsworth is a 60-year-old volunteer who recently worked at the Vancouver 2010 Athletes’ Village. She was chosen from among approximately 75,000 around the world who had applied for various volunteering positions.

Barbara has always believed that getting involved is a great way to stay active, meet people and give back to others. She practised that creed in Ontario, serving on a local Habitat for Humanity committee and continued when she moved to Victoria three years ago. In short order, she became a front-desk civilian volunteer for the Victoria Police Department and co-ordinated 60 volunteers for the 2009 TASTE, Victoria’s Festival of Food and Wine.

That volunteering spirit helped when the call came for Olympic volunteers in the summer of 2008. Prior experience counted in her favour. Even filling out the five-page application required a high degree of commitment. Sport-specific venues required at least 13 shifts of eight-10 hours. Hundreds of hours would be expected of those applying for celebration events like the Opening and Closing ceremonies. There were also mandatory training sessions for various steps of the journey plus travel and accommodations at the volunteers’ own cost. All this plus, an Olympian amount of patience waiting to find out if the application was successful.

Undaunted, Barbara’s persistence paid off. She jumped hurdles along the way, like ferrying to Vancouver for the five-hour introductory training/screening session where she had to bring a police-vetted security check and passport, plus undergo individual interviews and team-building exercises, conducted at the Pacific National Exhibition site. After that day, she went home knowing that two out of three volunteers would go no further in their quest for one of several positions; from VIP drivers to direction-givers to over 1,200 slope side ski groomers or 400 Polyclinic volunteers. In the fall of 2009, Barbara finally heard that she was wanted for a position - host at the Athletes’ Village site on False Creek.

Right up until January 2010, Barbara was required to attend two more three-hour sessions for her site and job-specific training plus a fitting for her uniform and a final draft of her schedule. She was going to have 15 nine-hour shifts - six 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. ones and nine 2 p.m. to 11 p.m. ones. Outfitted with an Olympic ring-emblazoned jacket and the Vancouver 2010 blue/green motif vest, toque and long-sleeved shirt as well as black trousers, Barbara started work with her accreditation card accompanying her everywhere, from two to four straight days on and six days off, never more than two in a row, over 20 days, Feb. 8-28.

A week before the official Games opening, athletes trickled in for venue practices. Some of Barbara's responsibilities included daily briefings reminding volunteers to avoid picture-taking or chatting up the athletes to ensure the village remained a peaceful refuge, or to be advised of Internationally Protected Person visitors like Arnold Schwarzenegger or grief counsellors after Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili died. Assignment meetings, such as assisting more than 9,500 security personnel by scanning accreditation cards and bags for the 2,730 guests of the village, checking the Athlete Team Entry/Exit where they loaded on buses to go to and from venues, plus bag check at the Athletes’ Dining Hall. Monitoring accreditation at the Polyclinic Doping Control Centre, or at the Welcome Centre for newly arriving athletes, or the Guest Pass area deployment to the Canadian Olympic Team Residence concierge desk to check visitor accreditations, necessary as Canada started racking up medals.

Barbara kept a blog of her experience too. There were volunteers from afar including Bengaluru, India and Fiji and they plus athlete/celebrities were in a constant mix. It was a heady and whirlwind experience. On Feb. 12, she wrote,

“I am just a little tired. Fifteen days of standing for nine-and-a-half-hour shifts is finally getting to this old girl. I have seen lots of gold medals, held a silver medal and seen lots of bronze. They are heavy and beautiful and the athletes are so humble who carry them. Yesterday, a Canadian Olympian went through security and set off the alarm. Her friend behind said out loud, 'it's probably the gold medal in her pocket.' Yes, it was. She pulled it out of her jacket, held it, got it wanded, then she was able to leave. She was almost embarrassed by the attention.”

Throughout the experience, Barbara collected several unforgettable memories.

“Experiencing the buzz of the competition mirrored in the village, seeing gold medal winners having quiet moments on benches in the sun, observing the swagger of hockey teams and organized primness of figure skaters. Being up close and personal to all those stars was pretty amazing,” she says.

Barbara also appreciated the recognition and memorabilia given to the “Blue Jacket Workforce” volunteers, the compliments from John Furlong and the IOC, the gratitude given to volunteers via cameos on venue jumbo screens, and gifts like a special Olympic pin or Olympic silver key chain.

“They called us heroes, but we were only doing what they asked and needed us to do,” she summed up in a typically Canadian humble way. In reality, she helped make the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games a memorable success for everyone.

MAY 2010 SENIOR LIVING MAGAZINE VANCOUVER & LOWER MAINLAND