Burrito West Blog

One of the funny things about the Olympics that I'd never heard of until they arrived here was the pin trading frenzy.

Apparently it's a whole big thing. Venues give out pins to the public, people visiting bring pins from their home towns, people have pins from previous Olympics, sponsors have pins.... and for the duration of the Olympics, it's a big pin trading convention. You wear your pins when you're out and about and people will randomly approach you to see what you've got or to trade.

I wasn't hugely into this because I only had 1 pin to start with (given to me by the City) and I didn't want to give it up. But I slowly acquired a few and put them on my lanyard and occasionally had little kids asking me if I would trade, which I did. One day at work we had a pile of Canada pavilion pins to give out (finally - people were always asking if we had Live City pins to give away and we didn't - it's hard telling adorable, hopeful children that you don't have anything to give them). I was working the security gate that day and kept my eye open for people who might like a pin. There was a little girl who was very nervous about going through the security gate (metal detector) and so when she bravely walked through, I offered her a pin and she shyly took it. It was stupid adorable. Her dad tapped me on the shoulder a minute later thanked me and offered me a pin from a little bag he had. I felt quite special. Until the security dude ran over and asked if he could have one too. The dad looked very annoyed but gave him one. (That's the downside of pin trading - some people are quite obnoxious about trying to obtain pins.)

In the end, I have a nice little collection of pins to remind me of the Olympics and most have a particular memory of how I got it. But I'm actually more taken with the effect they had on people - because the pins became an ice breaker - if you wanted to strike up a conversation with someone, you could comment on their pins, or discuss trading or whatever. People who never would have conversed otherwise, had interactions - and that's something very valuable. Little metal pins that appear to just be souvenirs of a time and event.... actually became part of a city-wide scavenger hunt with thousands of players. Just another thing that unexpectedly made the Olympics so fun and friendly.