Victory Ceremony and Great Big Sea

Tickets for tonights medal ceremony was only $22 retail and since my friend bought and sold a 3rd for $80, he made enough profit selling it that we didn't have to pay anything! Crazy what people will pay for Olympic tickets!

There were 2 medals awarded tonight at BC Place and 2 at Whistler. No Canadians tonight.
My friend was in from Germany, and there was one.

Ladies parallel giant slalom snowboard, Netherlands for Gold, Russia and Austria following.
Freestyle skiing, men's aerials, Belarus for Gold, USA and China following.

Biathlon, men's 4 x 7.5 km relay, Norway for Gold, Austria and Russia following. Alpine skiing, Germany for Gold, Austria and Czech following. Germany's Maria Riesch is a top athlete for that country.

It was Newfoundland and Labrador day today and there were musicians from there but unfortunately I didn't who any of them are. Too bad they didn't have their names on the screen.

Great Big Sea are the headliners and they were very energetic. Too bad we were 3 rows from the top of the stadium, but still some energetic fans up here. I would say that it was about 80-90% full. They only used half the stadium. The semi final men's hockey game was on next door at Canada Hockey place, so I think most of the people were there. Canada vs. Slovakia. We kept getting updates along the way, but we found out later it wasn't accurate (We heard 4-0), but we still won, 3-2! On to the finals on Sunday with USA!

After the concert ended, we met up with my friends from Germany. They were wearing German colours in the form of a Dr. Seuss style hat and a wig. They were getting a lot of attention, good and bad, but still lots of fun. Next time I travel, I'm going to wear Canadian colours and walk around and see what happens.

We headed towards Japadog, since we didn't eat yet and it was so famous, they had to try it before going home. I tried the Okonomi the other day (bonito flakes, fried cabbage, mayo on kurobuta pork, okonomiyaki sauce). I tried Ume today (bratwurst, plum sauce, raw red onion). Better than a standard dog for sure.

On the way, we stopped at Beard Papa's for the famous Chinese style cream puff. Here is their welcome to the world tower of cream puffs.


We were headed towards Germany Fan Fest (which was at Steamworks pub near the Waterfront station) because my friends have VIP tickets since they bought their Olympic tickets from Germany. However, we got sidetracked by the fireworks, fire and light show at Robson Square. We stopped to go to the Roots store because my German friends wanted to buy some clothing. So easy to get distracted here, so many things to see and do, and so many people.

While we were there, we saw the finals for the short track speed skating. Canada won gold and bronze for the men's 500m (Charles Hamelin and Francois Louis-Tremblay). Finally, Charles Hamelin got his medal! His girlfriend and silver medallist Marianne St-Gelais jumped from the stands and onto the field of play to hug and kiss him! How cute is that! That's the kind of support and love that an athlete deserves. Apolo Ohno got disqualified, and Korea took silver (Si-Bak Sung). Korea is just so fast! Poor Tyson Heung, my non-Canadian favourtie, finished 5th. Hey, at least you're here competing, not everyone can do that. I wish I was the one to support him...:)

We also got Gold for the 5000m relay. Yay for the Hamelin brothers! It was so disappointing to watch them come in 4th and 5th place in the individual 1000m race behind Apolo Ohno and the 2 Koreans (Si-Bak Sung and Jung-Su Lee) especially since they were leading most of the race. I think they can't pass as well as them. Olivier Jean and Francois Louis-Tremblay were the other 2 members.

3 more medals for us, we are now 3rd for the medal count and the most gold, at 10!!!! How proud am I to be Canadian. I find myself so emotional when our athletes win. I played sports throughout my student years and still play recreationally now. Too bad it's too late for me to be an Olympian, but I BELIEVE!

Since it was just past 11pm, we decided to head over to the CTV live broadcast with Pamela Martin and Bill Good on Robson Street to see if we could get the Germany colours on TV. It was crazy loud and pushy, lots of Canada flags, people on people's shoulder's, 9/11 signs, etc. There was a spectator with a large paper mache Muk Muk and she moved from the back to the front and then we couldn't see anything at all. We stayed for almost the whole hour, but then just couldn't take it anymore.

We headed towards GE plaza and got our photos taken with the bobsled and the snowboard. It was raining a bit, but it was just too hard to use an umbrella. We just stuck it out and then headed home about 1130pm. No Germany Fan Fest tonight.