Saturday 2 August 2014

Olympiad - disorganised and chaotic

At some of the previous Olympiads I have been to, weeks out from the event there were all sorts of predictions of calamity. This was most pronounced before the 2010 Olympiad, when it actually turned out to be one of the best Olympiads organised.
On the other hand the lead up to the Tromso Olympiad was more notable for spats between the organisers and FIDE, but the assumption was that the Olympiad itself would be fine.
Unfortunately it hasn't got off to a good start, at least where I am concerned. Despite being required to register months in advance, basic information concerning accommodation and accreditation was very slow in coming. I did not find out which hotel I was staying at until just before I left Australia, although this information did contain quite a hefty invoice. So imagine my surprise when I turned up to my designated hotel, to find they had never heard of me. A trip across to the registration centre found that although they may have heard of me, they could not find my accreditation (which I was charged for months ago), and that I had to speak to other people concerning the hotel. This next group of people were slightly more helpful in that told me I had been sent the wrong information, and that I was staying in a different hotel. Of course when I arrived at the new hotel, they had not heard of me either (which was by now not a surprise), but at least the receptionist was able to find me a room only slightly larger than me. (Oh, and the accommodation office forgot to return my passport).
To me what I am seeing (and I witnessed a number of other people with similar issues), is an event that has the potential to overwhelm the organisers, with a large volunteer staff who have not been given adequate information to do their jobs. They have been polite an well meaning, but have not been able to solve what I would regard as fundamental problems.
Of course my mood hasn't been helped by the somewhat casual attitude that Norwegian Air has to airline schedules, arriving in Oslo an hour late this morning, so that any hopes of making a connecting flight were torpedoed. Although even if they were on time, the somewhat slow pace of passport control and luggage delivery may have made this an inevitability. So I (and a few others) missed the opening ceremony, while I may spend the rest of the night trying to sort out a shed load of issues.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I gather it's all going to plan then?