Absolutely Awesome! You Rock, Halifax!

Those were just some of the reviews by the young athletes attending the Closing Ceremonies of the 2011 Halifax Jeux du Canada Games.
And, what a two-week celebration of the spirt of sport. A total of 2,700 athletes from ‘every part of this land of ours’ -- according to ‘Look Out, World!’ the first official Canada Games fight-song -- flocked to Halifax and the ski hills of Nova Scotia to perform in winter sports.
An estimated 50-thousand people attended free concerts by local and national stars in ‘Celebration Square’ at Grand Parade, in front of City Hall. There were also excellent exhibitions in many areas of the arts presented and performed by students from all over Canada, at the new auditorium at Citadel High School.

We offer congratulations to the local organizers, who ran an almost-perfect event over 17 days, turning the Closing into a ‘Nova Scotia Kitchen Party’ with athletes, plenty of music -- from Pipe Bands, rap and classical -- short speeches and fun.
The 6,103 volunteers were prominent in the ‘thank-yous’ in the official speeches for a job well done.
Media reviews of Games coverage were mixed. The local daily Chronicle Herald newspaper ran an excellent Section EACH DAY of news, features, results, with color photos, along with regular news items.
However, local CTV, and TSN (often called ‘Toronto’s Sports Network’) presented surprisingly little / poor coverage of the Games, and only of a couple of major sports. They had seized the TV rights from the CBC, but seemed to be keeping the events under wraps, not even sharing pictures nor results with other stations. Parent company Bell Aliant presented live streaming of most events on the internet ... without commentary or scoreboards. The system registered more than 400 thousand hits.
The best radio coverage came from ‘Seaside FM,’ a local community station.

While Team Quebec ran away with the medal count, Team Ontario captured the Games flag for the best record, where the performance of every athlete in every sport was tallied.
Both the Most Improved and Best Sportsmanship awards were taken by the host province.
The next Games will be held in Sherbrooke, Quebec, in the Summer of 2013.
Our Lieutenant Governor, The Honourable Mayann E. Francis, declared the Games officially closed, and, for the folks at Metro Centre, the real party began.
But, there were mixed emotions, and even a few tears, as our visitors had to bid a ‘Farewell to Nova Scotia.’