Acceptance and inclusion the ultimate Special Olympics victory

IT’S almost impossible to describe Shanghai. A city of 20 million people that seems to go on for ever.

Thousands of skyscrapers, many of them built to fantastic designs and brilliantly lit at night. A wide river where the endless traffic runs in three lanes in each direction. A constant buzz of activity in factories, shops, offices and on the streets. Markets where the range of incredible goods and designer labels is matched by the never-ending hum of loud haggling and bargaining — bargaining that usually results in designer handbags or watches changing hands for €30 or less. They’re fake, of course, but they’re about the only thing about this city that is.

And everywhere you go here, it’s gone a bit green. For the Special Olympics World Games, Ireland has sent its largest-ever delegation abroad. As a proportion of our population, we have the largest delegation at the Games by far. The vast majority of them have paid their own way to be here — many of them raising money for Special Olympics in the process. Nearly 1,000 of us are here, primarily to support our athletes but also to help out in the overall organising of the Games. And to have a whale of a time in the process.