I was on an LA-bound Amtrak train out of Salt Lake City in July 1984 and found the snack bar. I got a beer and sat next to some men who were comparing the Olympic tickets they had: track and field, gymnastics, swimming. They had event calendars spread out on the table and had marked those they bought tickets for. They booked them months ago.
‘What events did you book?’ they asked me. ‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘I’m just going to feel the vibe of an Olympics. Maybe I’ll catch an event or two.’ I hadn’t been planning the trip for months like they had. In fact I only decided a couple of days before to make the trip. I was in the neighbourhood. I was in the state of Washington in July visiting from my home in Costa Rica. I had nowhere I needed to be so I figured I’d visit LA.
‘Good luck,’ the men said. ‘Tickets sold out months ago.’
I got to Union Station and took some city buses to Leisure World in Seal Beach to hang out with my grandparents and maybe see my dad (don’t think that ever happened).
LA was maxed out with Olympic garb. I actually caught the mood. Soon, it wasn’t enough just to be in LA and catch the vibe. I wanted to immerse myself in the Olympics. But tickets were pretty sparse and I didn’t have much money. I went to a ticket vendor who said everything was pretty much sold out … except for field hockey. I had never seen the sport played before so I said ‘why not’ and bought a ticket and travelled out to the East Los Angeles community college football stadium. Hardly anyone was there so I got to sit on the 50-yard line. It wasn’t much of a match. Pakistan thrashed the Kenyans 3-0 and went on to win gold. I didn’t quite understand the game but it was fun.
Then I learned you could go to Long Beach and watch the sailing. So I took a bus from Seal Beach to Long Beach. It was free to watch but from the beach there wasn’t much to see.
It was a little bit of being special though given that 26 years earlier I was born in Long Beach.
It wasn’t quite the Olympic experience but I was happy to see something at least and to just be there. But then I was watching news with my Grandma and Grandpa when there was an announcement that the seats allocated to the Soviets were now being made available. The Soviets boycotted the LA Olympics but I guess they never told anyone they didn’t want their tickets.
A Costa Rican friend, Maya, said she’d be in LA that summer and gave me her number before I left for the US. I gave her a call and asked if she wanted to try to score some of the returned Soviet tickets. She did.
We went to an official venue where tickets were being sold. We were too late. The tickets were snapped up immediately and people were walking away. But a guy with a transistor radio heard that some tickets were available in Seal Beach. He called out to no one in particular … ‘anyone wanna go to Seal Beach and take our chances?’ Maya and I had no objection.
Joe had a souped up black Ford pickup and drove us to the Seal Beach shopping mall. There was a queue when we arrived but people were walking away with tickets. We waited. Joe was scanning a program. ‘What are you guys shooting for?’ he asked Maya and me. ‘Whatever’s available,’ I said. He said he was going try to August 6. Carl Lewis was in line to break the world’s record in the long jump and going for four gold medals to equal Jesse Owens records. I looked at Maya and she nodded in agreement.
And it was our lucky day. Not only did we get tickets, but we got trackside seats at a marquee track and field day – 6 August. Joe got the ticket right before us and right next to us.
Joe lived near my grandparents and offered to pick me up and then drive to Maya’s as well and take us to the Coliseum.
You really can’t immerse yourself anymore in the Olympics than walking into the Coliseum and standing under the Olympic torch. It was pretty damn spectacular. We were almost embarrassed when we found our seats. Right smack in front of the flag poles and the athlete interview zones.
A TV camera man pointed his camera at Maya, Joe and me. I put on an act and started cheering at no one in particular. Then Joe remembered he had made a sign. He held it up but it was the wrong side so he flipped it. ‘DAMN!’ The camera man yelled. ‘I was beaming this out to the entire world. As soon as you flip a sign they cut me. Damn political messages.’ I looked at Joe’s sign. It said ‘Hi Mom’.
Carl Lewis disappointed. He took one jump, secured the gold, and went no further. He claimed later he came for gold medals and not world records and had an event later in the day. But we saw Valerie Brisco-Hooks break a record in the 400 metres and pray on the track, Joaquim Cruz beat Sebastian Coe in the 800s, Kingdom and Foster go one-two for United States in the 110 m high hurdles and a little Italian win the 10,000 metres.
It was all pretty spectacular.
And none of it was planned … it just happened. Serendipitously.
