 Athletes regroup after a false start in the women's marathon at the World Athletics Championships in Daegu, Saturday. Due to mistakes on the part of the event staff, the women marathon runners had two false starts. / AP-Yonhap |
By Yoon Chul and Chung Min-uck
DAEGU ― Here in Daegu Stadium over 5,000 volunteers work an average of eight hours a day to assist spectators and the media.
The volunteers frequently have to soothe nerves of media representatives frazzled by inconveniences.
“The shuttle bus didn’t come; I had to wait for hours,” said a photographer from Europe.
The wait for the media-only shuttle bus is usually an hour, longer on Saturdays. The delay was due to miscommunication regarding the shuttle bus schedule.
It was the volunteers who calmed members of the press from reaching boiling point. They kept smiling and tried to help, even when they didn’t have information to answer the questions.
“They are really nice to us. Always smiling,” the photographer said, finding consolation in the hospitality, if not the exactness of the services.
There is also a dearth of places to eat around the stadium.
“The lack of food is a problem,” the photographer said, requesting anonymity. “Even when I want a cup of coffee, it is very tough to find it.”
The shortage of cafeterias is also a problem for spectators. To buy even a bottle of water, spectators must wait in long lines, anxious that they may miss events.
The volunteers who take care of the smallest details in the event’s management have their own hardships, too. Out of around 6,000 volunteers originally recruited, just over two-thirds are on the spot assisting in the running of the events, as the rest of the volunteers failed to show up on the first day. As a result, the burden now rests on the existing volunteers. Original assignments have been changed and the workloads have doubled.
The problems in the committee’s management had been known since the pre-championship meets at Daegu, which were held every year since the city was chosen to host this year’s worlds in March 2007.
During the pre-championship meeting this May, press and related officials had a hard time entering the stadium even with their IDs due to a miscommunication between the committee and field workers. Not much was different this time around, and spectators and others are now caught between the mix of the organizers’ sub-par management skills and the state-of-the-art equipment.
On Saturday, the first day of the championships, the women marathon runners had two false starts due to mistakes on the part of the event staff.
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