Back to the newsroom
After a short break, I am back at the Singapore Press Holdings News Centre. This blog is slightly out of sync with real life so you will have to bear with me. I left you on the morning of Thursday 24 July after the Brazil team had arrived so to get up to speed I will run through the events that occurred during their visit up until Monday 28 July.
Naturally, covering Brazil's visit meant heading more or less straight to the Mandarin Oriental in the morning. Almost as soon as I arrived at the News Centre I heard from Terrence that there was a press conference with Dunga scheduled for 12:30pm. In my inbox I had a congratulations message (for my first 'additional reporting' tag) from another intern called Gabriel - he works solely for The Sunday Times, the Sunday edition of The Straits Times, and I had met him the previous evening at the airport. At the moment he is contributing to a large feature about the direct impact the Olympic Games are having on Singapore. I told him about the press conference and we decided to get a cab and get to the Mandarin Oriental sooner rather than later.
We arrived at the hotel and I found fellow sports intern Kai Wee who had been hanging around since breakfast but unfortunately didn't have any news to speak of. He had seen some of the team members leave the hotel and return. Among them was Ronaldinho and Kai Wee attempted to fire off a few questions but Ronaldinho - mistaking what Kai Wee was after - simply took his notepad, autographed it and said 'Thank you'. Bummer.
Gabriel had made arrangements to view the team's private dining area with the Mandarin Oriental's Director of Communications, Ruth Soh, so Terrence and I tagged along to have a look. The room was laid out for lunch and Ruth was explaining the various requirements that had been given by the team. They had requested precisely what food the team would be eating and the hotel's in-house Michelin-star chef was personally overseeing the preparation of all the food. Ruth also invited us to look at one of the rooms that the players were staying in so while Terrence headed to Ballroom 1 to suss out what was happening with the press conference, Gabriel and I went up to the 15th floor to look at one of the luxurious rooms.
Once that was over we headed downstairs for the press conference. I regrouped with Terrence and Kai Wee. We had a quick chat about the press conference and while doing so the full media troop began to arrive - cameramen from ESPN, Reuters, Channel NewsAsia; reporters from AP (Associated Press), AFP (Agence France-Presse) and of course a large contingent of the Brazilian media. I met a number of the people I had seen the day before and we exchanged a few words before sitting down a few minutes before 12:30pm poised and ready. The photographers and cameramen assembled by the door ready for Dunga's arrival and we all waited. Several minutes passed before Rhonda, the PR representative for the Brazil team announced that Dunga was delayed eating his lunch and will be another 30-45 minutes. A collective groan.
Dunga did finally arrive and the press conference proved to be quite interesting. Initially the questions revolved around Robinho and Real Madrid's 11th hour decision not to release him. Dunga was evidently becoming agitated by the relentless questions and after the fifth or sixth Roderigo - the team's media officer - cut in and said that there were to be no more questions about Robinho: "Look, Kaká's not here, Robinho's not here. Let's stop talking about the team that isn't here and start talking about the team that is here."
As the press conference ended Terrence, Kai Wee and myself resumed our previous activity of loitering in the hotel lobby. We spotted a number of fans that had begun to congregate outside the hotel and Terrence toyed with the idea of seeing if we could get anything interesting from them. Realising that we didn't have a photographer with us, he said that it probably wouldn't be worth doing. Little did he know that I had been carrying my camera around since my first day and welcomed the chance to finally use it constructively. We decided that it was worth speaking to them and while Kai Wee and I walked over and interrogate the fans, Terrence went to speak to some of the media types also hanging about in the hotel lobby.
Fortunately it turned out that one of the guys who was waiting to catch a glimpse of Ronaldinho was the President of the Faroe Islands Swimming Federation - which was rather bizarre. He was staying at the Marina Mandarin Hotel - which sits confusingly nextdoor to the Mandarin Oriental - and had come to have a look after reading about the Brazil team in The Straits Times that morning. We got a few photos and took down some notes before regrouping with Terrence. I told him about the Faroe Islands chap and he suggested I do a small write-up when we were back at the News Centre.
The Brazil team were going to be heading to the gym at 3pm with the intention of having a training session at 4:30pm at the somewhat derelict National Stadium. By this time it was now 4pm and they were - as became the trend - delayed. With nothing else to do, we headed there anyway to lie in wait.
The National Stadium of Singapore officially closed on 30 June 2007 to make way for the new Sports Hub which is set to open in 2011. However, due to the lack of an alternative suitable space for big events to be held, the rusty gates are regularly unlocked and the place given a bit of a dusting when something unforeseen needs a venue. Brazil's arrival is certainly unforeseen and the friendly between Brazil and Singapore occurring on Monday 28 July was organised with seven days' notice! This is a testament to the incredible organisation witnessed across this island.
We were informed that there was to be a mixed zone at the National Stadium when the Brazilians arrived. If you know what this means, well done to you, but I didn't so here's a definition from the Beijing 2008 website:
"The Mixed Zone facilitates contact between the media and the athletes in a designated area near the exit of the field of play."
Thus when the team arrived the press got to interrogate Diego and Lucas who were armed with their interpreter. Roderigo hung back overseeing the press attack and listening to the questions that were being asked. Terrence had asked Kai Wee and I to make as many notes as we could but it was pretty hopeless with the intensity of the other reporters, photographers and cameramen.
At one point I was standing just adjacent to a charismatic-looking westerner with an English accent who was asking Diego a question about his decision to go against his club's wishes (like Robinho, Diego hadn't actually been released by his club). I noticed he was holding an ESPN mic and was therefore probably an acquaintance of Ian - the Web Editor for ESPN Star who I had met the night before. It sounded as though Diego had given quite an interesting answer and as the guy had been holding a mic to his mouth I managed to catch him just after the mixed zone. He introduced himself as Christy and said he hadn't heard what Diego had said either but he would take my number and let me know when he got back to the studio.
The squad then had their training session which unfortunately wasn't particularly interesting. Although it was quite comical watching the likes of Ronaldinho and Anderson playing 'it' and various other games as they were warming up. During the training I saw Christy down next to the pitch who seemed to be recording a report with his cameraman.
As the session was getting near the end, Terrence suggested I take a cab back and file my story about the Faroe Islands chap and I gladly followed his suggestion.
Back at the sportsdesk the TV was on with ESPN SportsCenter Asia summing up the news and guess who was sat in a cream suit behind the desk as the anchor? It was Christy. The report on Brazil's visit to Singapore showed the footage I had seen him shooting of Diego and his report beside the pitch - it was very exciting. They also showed some Reuters footage of the Brazil team at their hotel and astonishingly they had captured the exact moment where Kai Wee's notepad is taken from him and autographed by Ronaldinho which brought about a few laughs among the sports news team.
With everything in the bag I headed home after a hard day's work - somewhat excited about having a proper story of my own in print the next day.
