The validity of presence at every single Olympic venue, access to every possible event, free transportation and the goggled eyes of the curious passersby, enviously staring at your oversize badge, hanging long from down the neck on the chest at all times except when asleep like a log after a hectic day in the enticing hotel bed – that’s what the Olympic Accreditation is. It also means running like crazy from one place to another to get a glimpse of what’s going on.
When officially accredited, you want to be magically ubiquitous in the Olympic town which is practically impossible to do – there are conflicts of interest on the busy schedule of events all the time. Accreditation means pleasure, hard work, responsibility, power, rights and obligations, and a sense of confidence that you are legally and indispensably an inseparable and immune part of the huge Olympic family. Accreditation puts you at a special desk in the tribunes, allocated for media representatives for comfortable writing, supplied with electrical sockets to stick a fitting plug in, desk-lamps and individual TV screens for watching the details you don’t want to miss if you are a paid journalist. If accredited, the special Games’ vehicles are at your disposal to reach any destination, and the underground card in the pocket whizzes you in any desirable direction, fitting in your day’s plan. Free bottles of spring water, offered by smiling and caring volunteer workforce is also part of the accreditation. Speaking of the Olympic Workforce, consisting of patient and well-oriented men and women of any age and origin, they are extremely badge-oriented, strictly defining the spot of your belonging on the territory. The accreditation badge carries myriad letters and numbers precisely denoting your place and role in the Games and it is the job of working volunteers to usher you around unmistakably – blunders and bungles also taking place. In most cases, your Accreditation makes you feel well taken care of, in certain events even nursed like a baby. Olympic Accreditation means to be part of history, evolving right in front of your eyes, clearly reflecting all good and bad outcomes concerning your country. Accreditation involves spending money by your sponsor for guaranteeing your presence in the Olympic Games which you want to justify at all costs – nobody wants to be a good-for-nothing part of history. It is also noteworthy that you cannot get an Accreditation unless you are functional in the process, and to be functional means that you are doing something worth the money, spent on your accreditation. It is too bad if you are not functional and you still have an Accreditation for some unlikely reason, but this could also be a case — and quite often too — depending on the judgment by the powers that be. Accreditation means sweat in the first place, inevitably accompanied by a guilty conscience if your athlete comes to a cropper all of a sudden, and with a sense of elation if another one manages to cut the mustard. As both may happen, you better be careful not to eat your Accreditation badge up when stricken badly by emotion. If you do by any chance, you might immediately turn into nobody – that’s how powerful the Olympic Accreditation is!
