Bikes were among the many supplies being readied in Auckland yesterday. Photo / Dean Purcell
Bikes were among the many supplies being readied in Auckland yesterday. Photo / Dean Purcell
KEY POINTS:
In just a few days a 12-metre container, full of gear, will be loaded aboard a boat to China.
Inside it will be stowed all the equipment required to help the New Zealand team realise its Olympic dreams.
Everything from printers and plasma TVs, to medicines and mueslibars are included in the inventory, which leaves Auckland on May 25.
More equipment - including uniforms - will be flown to China on June 30.
"A lot of this gear we have carted around for the past few games," says chef de mission Dave Currie, and most of it will be used to make Olympic Village life as comfortable as possible.
Games organisers have provided the New Zealanders with "a blank canvas, pretty much", on which to build a village, so a Maori gateway, and 800kg granite base with accompanying sculpture, should help brighten the place up a bit.
"NZ banners and signs" will add an Antipodean touch to village environs, as should the five outdoor umbrellas.
The Olympic list is nothing if not comprehensive, to the point of being mundane.
Twelve office chairs are making the trip to China, with 12 whiteboards and an extension ladder.
Sharp-eyed readers might spot an anomaly in the list: 32 drying racks, but only two irons.
That, says Currie, is because the space-age outfits to be worn by our athletes don't require anything as quaint as ironing.
"The kind of gear we have got, you wash it, you shake it, and it's damn near dry."
Six fans and two boxes of air cleaners will help the athletes breath easy.
Dispatching 300 cans of rice to China might sound as sensible as sending coal to Newcastle, but Currie says creamed rice provides a quick blast of carbohydrates to exhausted athletes at the end of their events.
Team management has "no concerns about food or dining" while in China.
The team has banked on the equipment taking a month to clear customs, and Currie is confident everything will be in place by the time the 300-strong squad arrives in China.
An advance guard is scheduled to leave New Zealand for China on July 19, with the first athletes set to touch down on July 27.
