One of the many challenges for VANOC is feeding hoards of volunteers 3 times a day at several different venues. I don’t know how many volunteers are working in the Athletes Village on any given day but the number is in the hundreds. Apparently there are 20-25,000 volunteers across all the sites.

Each individual receives a meal ticket when they check-in for their shift each day, evening or night. Every day there are 2 meat choices and a vegetarian one, as well as soup, salad, bread and butter, a drink and dessert for each person. Coffee, tea and hot chocolate are available all day long – particularly appreciated when it’s rainy and cold.

The food isn’t spectacular and lots of people are complaining but it tastes very good when you’re hungry! Dozens of volunteers are behind the serving tables dishing up the food. The lineups are long at key times of the day – an opportunity to get to know others in different jobs in the Village. Rumor has it that the cops – paid staff not volunteers – have complained about the food and so it has improved but I haven’t seen any difference.

It’s really interesting to see that the volunteer corps represents all ages and life stages, lots from the Vancouver area as well as other parts of BC. Then there are people like us from other provinces and a few from other countries.