Journalists descend on Rio like an avalanche

Over the next 21 days the eyes, ears, hearts and minds of humanity will be focused on Rio de Janeiro where the 31st edition of the Olympic Games will be taking place.

Only a handful of the world’s population of six billion will be able to attend these games physically while the majority will rely on news updates from journalists and media outlets.

Indeed the second largest group of professionals at the Olympics might be journalists who probably come second to an estimated 10,500 athletes who will participate in the Summer Games.

The main Press Center within the Olympic Stadium has recorded an estimated 5000 journalists within its premises over the last one week and there are obviously many more who will be roaming the streets of Rio looking for exclusive stories.

Meanwhile over 10,000km away in a terminal of the Bole airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Olympic excitement reached fever pitch as journalists from Ethiopia, Egypt, China and India compared notes while they waited for their connecting flight to Rio.

One would’ve mistaken some of them for athletes as they donned the official kit of their teams, a testimony to the efficiency of their National Olympic Committees.

As soon as the Citizen TV cameraman pulled out his equipment to conduct an interview, a handful of other devices were pulled from travel bags betraying the number of journalists in the room.

Journalists love discounts and it seems that the Ethiopian Airline offered the best package for those keen to experience a South American Olympics.

Mandefro Taddesse is an Ethiopian journalist attending his first Olympic Games.

The National Media sports journalist describes the biggest sporting carnival on earth as, “a special game for Ethiopians and one which all journalists should attend at least once in their career.”

He has high hopes for the medal prospects of his nation but he doesn’t mind if his compatriots leave one or two medals for the Kenyans.

He is particularly wary of 800m Olympic champion and record holder David Rudisha and four-time world women distance champion, Vivian Cheruiyot, whom he believes are in great form this season.

When the topic of doping came up Tadesse described it as, “a very big problem in sports that needs to be addressed urgently.”

He believes that the Ethiopian athletics federation is doing everything in its power to keep their athletes clean.

-National kit-

Meanwhile, at the same airport a 16-strong travelling party of journalists from Egypt caught our attention because of their bright red national kit.

Their team leader is Gamar El Badrawey and the Deputy Editor In Chief of news. He quickly obliged our request for an interview and informed us as a matter of fact that, “we are going to Rio to cover the Olympics and we are very happy to be at the 31st edition. Egypt has 120 players from 20 federations and we are hoping for some medals.”

Badrawey is not worried about the Zika virus because he believes that the virus would only be lethal to pregnant women.

The sports commentator also believes that Rio de Janeiro will do a fantastic job with the Olympics despite all the issues raised by a section of European and North American media.

After a long countdown the stage is now set for the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games which will take place on Friday from 8pm Brazil time which means that Kenyans who want to watch that opening ceremony must stay up till 2am local time (+3GMT) on Saturday morning.

Waihiga Mwaura is reporting from Rio de Janeiro, follow his updates on Twitter through the handle @WaihigaMwaura and @citizentvkenya