Arrival in Athens

Fifty-three track and field athletes who participated in the Athens Olympic Games gathered here in the large conference room of the Athletics Management Center.

On the rostrum, Director Luo, the team leader of the national team Olympic track and field delegation, is introducing some of the on-site arrangements for the Olympics to the players.

"Because of the large number of participants, the athletes of our country mainly arrived in Greece in three batches. The first batch is currently the sailing windsurfing team, rowing, kayaking team, women's football, and gymnastics team, of which all the athletes of sailing, cricket, rowing, and kayaking have arrived in Athens. After all, water sports are greatly affected by wind and waves, so they have to arrive early to adapt to training. "

"The second batch of large troops will arrive in Athens on August 8 by a special plane. The table tennis, badminton, weightlifting, diving, swimming, archery, boxing, etc. are all in this batch. Due to their relatively large size, male basketball players will take another flight to Athens. The first two batches of athletes will arrive in Athens before the opening of the Olympic Games on August 13."

"As for our track and field delegation, we are scheduled to go to Athens in the last batch. We don't have a special plane so we need to take a flight by ourselves. Specifically, we will divide into three teams according to the principle of proximity. To Athens; coach Huang from Huangpu will transfer to Athens via the Netherlands; coach Sand from Huacheng will transfer to Athens via Hong Kong. Depending on the flight, the arrival in Athens will take place between August 17 to August 19."

"Another point I want to talk about is participation in the opening ceremony of the Athens Olympics. At the opening ceremony, our delegation is to form a phalanx. Some of the athletes are recommended by the organization. Other athletes can also sign up if they want to participate. So does any of you want to sign up?" Director Luo calmly asked.

Participating in the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games is a glorious thing, but at the same time, it is also a very tiring thing. The opening ceremony of the Olympic Games will go through many rehearsals in advance, which will take a lot of time. The opening ceremony is scheduled from 9 pm to 12 pm on the 13th in Athens time. If the time of the return trip is counted, it is estimated that it will be tossed to three or four in the morning.

The opening ceremony consumes a lot of energy from athletes, so many athletes will not choose to participate in the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games to avoid affecting the state of the game.

Also, Director Luo has just mentioned the transportation plan of the track and field delegation. If you sign up for the opening ceremony, it means that you have to go to Athens several days in advance. Acting alone without the collective is a not-so-good performance.

Moreover, if you leave the organization and arrive in Athens early, not to mention clothing, food, housing, and transportation, training alone is also a big problem. As a professional athlete, not training for a day may affect the state, let alone several days in a row.

Therefore, when Director Luo asked if anyone wanted to sign up for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games, the athletes in the stadium did not raise their hands. Even if some people wanted to participate, but they saw that they didn't make it, they endured.

Seeing that no one raised his hand, Director Luo nodded in satisfaction, and he did not want an alternative to appear in his team.

At this moment, an athlete sitting in the back row suddenly raised his right hand and shouted: "I want to sign up for the opening ceremony!"

Dozens of people in the conference room were all stunned, and then looked back collectively, and found that Zhang Guan raised his hand.

"Huh..." Director Luo was speechless. He didn't expect that there was such an ignorant athlete, and this ignorant athlete was one of the benchmarking figures in the track and field delegation.

But then Director Luo thought, after all, Zhang Guan was only 18 years old this year, even if he was a big kid, and played only one international game. It is normal for this age to be curious about things.

"Zhang Guan, I'm afraid you don't know yet. It takes a lot of time to participate in the opening ceremony. You have to get up early and get rehearsed in advance. You have to rehearse in advance and walk around the stadium several times." A front-row coach reminded.

"Yes, our track and field delegation will arrive in Athens several days after the opening ceremony. During this time, you will have to stay in the Olympic Village ..." Another coach said.

"It's okay, it's time to get familiar with the venue and local environment in advance. And I think it's a glorious thing to be able to participate in the opening ceremony of the Olympics, especially to participate in the athletes' team, to represent the motherland in front of the world, for me it is a great glory." Zhang Guan answered.

People who originally wanted to discourage Zhang Guan suddenly shut up. They didn't expect Zhang Guan to set the tone so high at once, even speaking on behalf of the motherland, which rose to the height of ideological consciousness. How can others persuade?

At the beginning of Zhang Guan's registration, everyone thought that Zhang Guan was young and curious, so some senior coaches sitting in the front row would persuade, but after listening to what Zhang Guan said, it was obvious that there are premeditated people who want to participate in the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games.

Director Luo sighed helplessly. For Director Luo, the words he said could not be changed naturally. Since Zhang Guan raised his hand in public to sign up, Director Luo could only agree to let Zhang Guan fill out an application form and report to the Olympic delegation team.

The official responsible for the propaganda of the Youth League quickly gave a reply, agreeing to Zhang Guan participating in the athletes' team at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games.

In the opening ceremony, the player's phalanx prefers the famous and good-looking athletes, the name of the first flying man in Asia was famous, so Zhang Guan will not be rejected for registration, not to mention Zhang Guan himself is a big man of more than one meter nine, in the queue the overall image also has advantages.

...

The next day, Zhang Guan went to the bank to exchange a part of the euro, and all the euros in the bank card were taken out. Now the sum of the euros on Zhang Guan is more than 160,000.

The maximum face value of the euro is 500 yuan, so 160,000 euros is a little more than three bucks, and a large envelope was used. It can be easily inserted into the mezzanine of the carry bag.

According to customs regulations, there is a limited amount of foreign currency to carry out of the country. However, the Olympic team took an Air China Boeing 747 special plane. The customs authorities released all the way, so Zhang Guan successfully brought a lot of euro cash into the aircraft.

At that time, the handling fee for cross-border withdrawals was much higher than ten years later, and international credit card giants were also trying every means to block UnionPay. As a result, the international credit cards processed by domestic UnionPay were not available in many places. Also, the foreign exchange administration's limit for cross-border withdrawals is 5,000 yuan per day, not US dollars, but national currency, which can be said to be pitiful. It was changed to 10,000 per day in 2008. Afterward, Chinese tourists gradually went to travel the world. The country's foreign exchange is also relatively sufficient, and the cross-border withdrawal limit has slowly been increased to 100,000 yuan per day.

It is precisely because of the various restrictions that Zhang Guan chose to carry euro cash directly. In fact, at that time, most people who went abroad also carried foreign currency cash. The entire Olympic delegation, except for those big athletes who often go abroad, have foreign bank cards, also, basically carry cash.

There is no direct flight class from the capital to Athens. If you take a civil airliner, you need to transfer. This time the Olympic delegation was chartered by direct flights, so it took only more than six hours to reach Athens.

The time difference between Athens and the capital is five hours. The flight departs at 2 pm in capital time and arrives in Greece at 3 pm in Athens time. The Athens Olympics Organizing Committee has provided a special "Olympic Family" channel for the participating countries in the Olympic Games, which can be used for customs clearance. The Olympic University's Pakistan University has already stayed in the closed parking lot of the airport. After the athletes left the airport, they were going to Pakistan University, Zhang Guan went straight to the Olympic Village.

The delegation did not hold any ceremonies at the airport or contact the media. This arrangement undoubtedly disappointed the waiting reporters. More than 200 reporters were waiting at the airport that day. They could only film some athletes pulling luggage across the road.

The Olympic Village of the Athens Olympic Games is located at the foot of a mountain. The Olympic Village is divided into accommodation areas and international areas. Both areas have access restrictions. The accommodation areas only allow athletes, officials and Olympic village staff to enter.

Most of the buildings in the accommodation area are three-story buildings, which adopt an apartment-style layout. In addition to the living room, each apartment has four bedrooms, two baths and bathrooms, and a balcony. There are two beds in each bedroom, that is, an apartment can accommodate eight athletes.

At the same time, the Olympic Village also has facilities such as hospitals, religious service centers, and libraries, all of which are free of charge.

Next, Zhang Guan will participate in the rehearsal for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games.

Before the arrival of the athletes, the Athens Olympic Committee has held many opening rehearsals, including rehearsals for the opening performances, light and sound rehearsals, rehearsals for the torch relay, ignition rehearsals, etc. It is possible to send only some athletes to participate, but the flag bearer of the side team must participate in the rehearsal.

The flag bearer of the Chinese delegation is a small giant. Since the men's basketball team is going to participate in the rehearsal, all the men's basketball team members will naturally follow the boss to participate in the rehearsal of the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. The rest also followed.

...

Rehearsal day at the Athens Olympic Complex.

As soon as he got out of the car, Zhang Guan grabbed the team's interpreter and said, "I have a stomachache. I have to squat in the bathroom for a while. Please help me tell them!"

"Are you all right, do you want the team doctor to check up on you?" The translator asked.

"It's okay, it's just a bit unacceptable," Zhang Guan said.

The translator nodded. It was normal for diarrhea symptoms to occur two days before going abroad. He pointed to a sign in the distance and said, "Don't get lost. We will gather there after the rehearsal for a while. That is the sign. If you can't find us, just wait there. Don't run around."

"No problem, you can rest assured that I can never get lost." Zhang Guan said as he rushed into the bathroom not far away while covering his stomach.

A few minutes later, seeing that all the teams participating in the rehearsal entered the stadium, Zhang Guan slipped out quietly. He took out a tourist map of Athens, looked at it carefully, and then quickly disappeared into the crowd.