March 2010

India  ... some impressions:

  • Getting through Immigration and Customs at Delhi for arrival (see departure, below) was a delight.  A crew from the Organisers facilitated everything!
  • the traffic in Delhi has not improved since I was last there 15 years ago: (if possible) it is more frenetic...
    Traffic lights, marked lanes, pedestrian crossings, one-way signs, etc., are all there - but for decoration only. 
  • Delhi does not smell the same as it  used to - I commented to Sharon Reynolds about this, and she agreed.  However, she assures me that once out of the area around Delhi (New and Old), India still has its own distinctive smell. 
  • The 20km to our hotel took about an hour, but what a hotel.  You can Google the Claridges at Surajkund; and it's as good as it looks in the ad; six stories of marble and glass.  Before anyone gets upset, our accommodation was provided by the Indian Organisers.
  • Road travel always was with armed escort vehicles - two 4x4s full of armed guards, one in front and one behind (with sirens and flashing lights (which the 'normal' traffic treated with utter disdain) and armed security on the busses
  • 05:30 starts to each day, breakfast at 06:00, then on to the Jury bus at 06:45 (not tht the 06:45 bus ever left on time)
  • the range is even bigger than it was on my last visit; 80 bays of 50M EST replaces the previous pit-marking 50M range; the 'old' 10M range is now the site for the 25M range; the old Armoury has a new, gigantic, Finals Hall behind it; a new 80-bay EST 10M range at the top of the hill; the Shotgun range has grown considerably...
  • Notably, the range buildings have lots of good-sized rooms for the ancillary bits to competitions.
  • Security was tight!  There were 800+ guards on the venue/accommodation and they were armed with lots of firearms.  Sandbag emplacements, 4x4s with machine gus, the works...
  • The road to the range was closed during the day while we were in competition-mode; only the competiton vehicles were allowed through, much to the annoyance of the locals
  • Three (3!) military bands as part of the Opening Ceremony
  • Spicy food
  • Customs and Immigration for departure from india was chaos; my transport to the airport did not arrive (fortunately, the Hotel provided a chauferred car); as a 'one off' for departure I did not get the red carpet treatment that the shooters received and was in the hurly-burly that is Delhi International Terminal.  The queues for Customs/Immigration and then for screening were gigantic and slow moving.  By contrast, Changi Airport for the change of planes was (as expected) a delight
  • Seeing Warren Potent win gold after a shoot-off at the the end of the 50M Prone Final
  • Back home to Sydney International and I had the 'electronic' passport work (as opposed to my previous attempt last year)

...and the range:
  • the Qualification ranges are Sius Ascor EST and up and running: 10M is 80 bays; 25M is 5 range sections + a function testing range; 50M is 80 bays
  • the Finals range (10/25/50M) is a gigantic work in progress.  The building is there, but only up to the fit-out stage.  6 months out from the Games, the venue is a construction site - but so was SISC 6 months before the 1999 Oceania.  With this goes dust and dirt, stacks of bricks, pavers, scaffolding, etc.
  • Almost everything gets locked up, and almost everything electrical is swithched off for the overnight closedown - including the cofee machines.  Each day we had to wait (sometimes hours) for somebody with the appropriate key to switch on the coffee dispensers - and the coffee comes in one option; sweet and white!
  • As mentioed above, there are lots of rooms included in the buildings.  Lack of ancillary rooms is one of the shortcomings of SISC whenever we have an international competition there - SISC was built on the premise that the extra rooms needed for a major competition would be added by having temporary structures added as and when needed 

Boys and their toys...

Somehow, a long-promised set of noise-cancelling ear buds found their way into my duty-free. 
These are fantastic on a long flight, whether you plug them in to the plane's AV system, or as I did for most of flights to India and back, plug into my MP3 player.  They dramatically cut back the noise level in the plane allowing me to set the volume way down and clearly hear the sound from the movie. MP3, or whatever.

Ear buds instead of the noise cancelling headphones?
The ear buds are substancially smaller and fit easily into a shirt pocket, and the hedphones get uncomfortable on a long flight.  

An MP3 player?
Originally purchased for training purposes (see 25M MP3 files>>), I have loaded an eclectic collection of tracks on to my $25 player that gives me 24 hours of the music I like - more than enough for long flights.

Regards to all,

Spencer (95.5 96.0 96.5 96.0 95.5 95.0 94.5 94.5 95.0 94.0 94.5 94.0 93.5 - not talking about the festive season - 94.0Kg) 93.5 after India and the good living.

 010310

© 2010, Spencer Tweedie