Fighting Against The Tears

Three years ago, at the end of the closing night of the MidZomerGracht festival, I stood at the bar of cafe De Wolkenkrabber when Evert van der Veen came up to me and said: "I've just spoken with Lou Manders of swimming club Nat Utrecht. You know what we're planning to do? ...getting the EuroGames over to Utrecht in 2005."
My only reaction was looking at him in disbelieve, raising my glass of beer and saying: "Well, good luck!"

At the after party in De Wolk Sunday night, yet again with a glass of beer in our hands, we both remembered this conversation. How wrong I've had been. The visions of Evert and Lou had been right, they had found the perfect people to do the job and we were now looking back at a successful EuroGames Utrecht.

Time -all of a sudden- seemed to have flown away. All the volunteers present felt a bit lightning struck and exhausted. Bits and pieces of stories about one and a half year of preparations, and especially about the last days, were told and re-told and fell together. You could only tell your stories to someone who was also a volunteer. Others couldn't understand and feel the intensity of emotions.

All of us had one final question: how to handle the upcoming black hole.
It turns out we all do it in our own way. A lot of us are still busy: moving stuff from the various locations back to were it came from, updating the web site, handling the enormous administration, answering the emails from Participants and others, and many, many other tasks that still have to be done.
Others are already looking forward, and talking about visiting Montréal and Chicago next year, or have left for a short vacation to build up their energy level again.

Before the start of the Closing Ceremony we had the intention not to crack, no matter how emotional it might become. But one time or the other in the upcoming weeks, the knowledge that the EuroGames Utrecht are over, is bound to emerge to the surface in its full extend, and then we'll give in.
And it's only then that the EuroGames Utrecht are truly closed.