Police line

Today has been very surreal. I was due at the Olympic Stadium at 1.30pm to start our rehearsals for the Opening Ceremony. After arriving at Stratford station I was told part of the station was closed due to an incident and was redirected to another exit. As soon as I got to Westfield I could see the outside section that we walk around to get to the Olympic Park was also closed and there were lots of police around. I still had no idea what was going on so headed through the shopping centre. I then realised another section had a huge police cordon around it and a police tent which is never a good sign. Further on in the shopping centre as I looked over the balcony there was another smaller police line with a forensic team working away. It was such a strange atmosphere to see shoppers on a Saturday afternoon intermingled with a serious crime scene. It was later that I found out that a 24 year old man had been stabbed and died at the scene the day before after being involved in a fight. I clearly have no idea what the fight was about was I cant believe anything is worth taking someone else's life for. I think the worse thing was how frustrated the shoppers appeared to be by the disruption the police were causing to their day!

After passing through this horrific scene it was on to the park and after clearing security and grabbing a lunch pack I met my friends in the Stadium. Its been a beautiful hot sunny day so we have been lucky again. We started the first section with another group which meant I got to see Andrew performing his part. It was great to be able to see how the two groups will come together and how all 1,500 people can work in the same area at the same time! They left at around 5.30/6ish and after a break we carried on to rehearse our section until 10pm. There was lots of hanging about today but we got to see some new features being tested but I cant say what - sorry. Its only 27 days to go now - arrrggghhh!


Westfield Shopping Centre, Stratford, London