This is an event that I volunteer for every year since it's inception. This is Gordie Howe's event. I look forward to seeing him every year at the event. However, this year, things took a turn for the worse for Mr. Hockey. He suffered a stroke a few weeks ago. He was recovering well after the stroke but heard he was getting worse on the day of the event.
I have met Mr. Howe before. Back in 2007 at the Memorial Cup event in Vancouver. I worked in hospitality and he was always around. Always made a point to say hi to me every day and made sure I saw his VIP wrist band when I was checking at access points. Mind you, he never needed to show it to me. He's Gordie Howe. The greatest hockey player ever. He never needed to show me his wrist band but he did cause that's just who he was. I finally got to have a conversation with him in the green room at the River Rock Theatre. Again, I was doing access control for the room when he walked over to me before heading up to the awards ceremony. I thought he was going to ask me where the bathroom was, but instead he wanted to know how I'd been doing and if I'd enjoyed being at Memorial Cup among other things. He wanted to small chat. It as a brief conversation but it was one I'll remember always. He never behaves like one of the other hockey greats who shall remain nameless, who wink at you and think they are the greatest people alive. He never made you feel cheap. Instead he made you feel appreciated. Gordie Howe to me is the most classiest person in hockey. I will say a prayer for him and send him good vibes. The hockey world needs more Gordie Howes. We can't lose him yet.
From the emails I received from the event a few days before, I noticed was that the location was different this year. It's always been held at the Canlan Ice Sports arena in North Vancouver. However, this year, it was held at the Planet Ice, formally The Great Pacific Forum, in Delta. It was a bit tricky getting there as its just off Nordel Way by the Alex Fraser bridge but curls around Anansis Island and back into Delta. In any case, I got there pretty quickly from Surrey thanks to google map.
The first thing I noticed when I walked in was that the area where the reception desk was located was inside another room close to the entrance. Not in the entrance like it was set up at Canlan. At Canlan it was ALWAYS freezing in that area. I'm talking super cold. Here, it was much warmer and more pleasant to work.
I met with the coordinator and she gave me the instructions on what to do and then gave me a breakfast voucher to eat at the restaurant upstairs. There were a group of us starting at our various tasks at 9am. It was still 8am when we got there. So, we all decided to get something to eat. I had a muffin, hashbrowns and eggs with a cup of coffee. Once we were all done eating we headed back down to our reception area. I sat down at the reception desk and go to work. The others had other roles and dissapeared. My role was to hand out tickets to those who had tickets left for them by a player or for those who donated to a player and to address all questions and solve problems. I saw a few Canucks Alumnis. The regulars were there, Gary Valk, Greg Adams and Darcy Rota. Kirk McLean, Gary Nyland and Theo Fleury are usually there too but I believe that McLean was touring in Kelowna with the Hockey Hometown event at the time. It was the second day of the tournament so I may have missed the others. I had to work the elections the day before so I missed the first day.
Here's Greg Adams doing an interview outside the reception area by the rink. Alzheimers is very close to his heart as his father suffers from it.
Close to lunch time, the other girls were setting up the jersey's for the All-Star game behind me. So I took pics.
I didn't have too much to do as it was slower on Sunday than it was on Saturday but it was still a fun event. The people who run the event are awesome and do a really good job of it. I was given another snack voucher around 10 am and then a lunch voucher as I was about to leave at 12 pm when my shift was over. I thought that was more than generous for their volunteers. I was given a lanyard to wear and got to be a part of something amazing again. I'll be back again next year. I hope Mr. Hockey will be back again too.
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