NPR reporter Rachel Treisman, about to discover the Olympic Village.
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Rachel Treisman/NPR
You are studying the Rachel Goes to the Video games publication — a glance behind the scenes on the Winter Olympics in Italy. Subscribe right here to get it delivered to your inbox.
I used to be among the many fortunate journalists who bought to take a peek across the Milan Olympic Village the week of the opening ceremony, Velcro-ing a “media” armband round my jacket and slipping right into a sea of journalists, volunteers and Olympians from all around the world.
The village is a sprawl of modular buildings and high-rise flats, with the flags and banners of the international locations in residence hanging from balconies and home windows. Sprinkled round it are necessary landmarks just like the Olympic rings statue, a health middle with cardio machines and weight racks, and a mindfulness room with coaches, yoga mats and tables for coloring and postcard writing. And the eating corridor, clearly.
My teammate Pien Huang and I sat down with Daniel Smith, the Group USA Olympic Village director, on the bottom flooring of the seven-story constructing that the U.S. shares with athletes from Japan.
Smith stated there are about 70 U.S. Olympians staying right here all through the Video games — keep in mind, solely speedskating, determine skating and ice hockey compete in Milan — in addition to some 40 U.S. help staffers. All instructed, the village will home some 1,500 athletes and group members from all over the world over the course of three weeks.
Smith defined that numerous choices about every day life within the village — from what athletes eat to after they sleep to who will get a roommate — are as much as the precise sports activities and people. However he and different U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee workers are there to “mitigate distractions,” whether or not that is facilitating transportation or serving to athletes who get locked out of their rooms.
“I feel the suggestions that we get is numerous gratitude,” stated Smith, who’s working his third Video games.
The cafeteria, the place the meals is deliberately bland.
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Rachel Treisman/NPR
Simply 72 hours after opening, it was too quickly to inform what side of the village may go viral. To date Smith hasn’t seen any of the Olympic-themed condoms that had been all the craze in Paris in 2024, or heard anybody fawning over particular desserts the way in which they did over the chocolate muffins (“We’re ready on the desserts to sort of hit”).
The truth is, the meals is not precisely making waves — which Smith says is on function. Round lunchtime, the one actual line we observed was for pasta with meat sauce. Whereas the yogurts, meats, greens, pasta, pizza and bread choices appeared like fairly commonplace cafeteria fare to me (decidedly NOT an athlete), Smith says the meals is blander than it appears to be like.
“We’re right here in Italy, in one of many capitals of gastronomy on the earth, however right here within the Olympic Village, the meals may be very catered to [be] sports-specific,” Smith provides. “So not numerous condiments, not numerous taste. You sort of need to taste your personal meals.”
What I am consuming
Panettone, heat from the oven.
Rachel Treisman/NPR
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Rachel Treisman/NPR
Weeks in the past, once I was researching-slash-manifesting quirky experiences for this text, I got here throughout an attention-grabbing tidbit: It is a custom in Milan for individuals to eat their leftover panettone — the raisin-studded Christmas fruitcake related to the town — on Feb. 3.
That is the feast day of San Biagio (Saint Blaise). The patron saint of throat diseases, amongst different issues, is credited with saving the lifetime of a younger boy who was choking on a fishbone — however has evidently taken on the position of protector in opposition to all types of throat-related illnesses, together with sleep apnea and strep.
In keeping with a number of native English-language publications, many households in Milan put apart a chunk of panettone at Christmastime to allow them to eat it later, as a strategy to shield in opposition to sickness throughout flu season. That appears to be the results of a special apocryphal legend, involving a peasant girl who introduced a panettone to a priest for a Christmas blessing however forgot to select it up till many weeks later.
In Olympic information
Tomàs-Llorenç Guarino Sabaté of Spain competes on the European Determine Skating Championships within the U.Okay. on Jan. 15. He’ll be allowed to put on his Minion overalls on the Olympics this month.
Yuan Tian/NurPhoto by way of Reuters
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Yuan Tian/NurPhoto by way of Reuters
We now have to speak about Miniongate.
In case you missed it: Spanish Olympian Tomàs-Llorenç Guarino Sabaté confirmed earlier this week that he was being pressured to vary the music to his Despicable Me-themed quick program — a nightmare, so near the largest competitors of his profession — attributable to a last-minute licensing dispute.
The web caught wind and rallied behind Sabaté within the hopes he might don his overalls in spite of everything, within the title of caprice and all that’s enjoyable. Yesterday, the skater posted on Instagram that Common Studios had reconsidered and granted him the rights for this explicit event, to which everybody responded: BANANA!
Music licensing has turn into an more and more thorny challenge in determine skating, which is why many older packages on YouTube are actually lacking their authentic scores. A set of American pairs skaters had been hit with — and finally settled — a lawsuit for allegedly utilizing an unauthorized cowl through the 2022 Beijing Olympics, and Group USA’s Alysa Liu needed to scrap her authentic Woman Gaga routine earlier this season as a result of she could not get the YouTube cowl rights. She debuted her revamped program in January, and I am positive you will hear extra about that from me later.
Earlier than you go
Katie Uhlaender of the U.S. after ending a ladies’s skeleton race warmth in March. After an enchantment, she was denied her probability to compete at her sixth Winter Video games.
Al Bello/Getty Photos
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Al Bello/Getty Photos
