As it is once again time to apply as volunteer for Eurovision in Copenhagen, I thought I could write about my experience of being a volunteer in Malmö 2013, hoping to inspire you to apply for this year’s event or any other in the future.
At the start of 2013 I was persuaded by friends to apply as a volunteer in Malmö. Being a part of the NSC (Nation Song Contest) community have made me realised how much I enjoy watching Eurovision and what a nice experience it would be to volunteer when it is hosted in my country, Sweden.
Said and done I applied, writing why I wanted to be a part of Eurovision; some info about what I’ve been doing before and describing myself as a person. After a while I received an email saying that I was through the first cut. The second part was to submit a video of myself, showing my personality in more detail, saying why I wanted to volunteer and what languages I could speak. When I saw that we had to record a video I got very insecure and did not want to send anything; I think I belong behind the camera and not in front of it. After some more thought and just some day before the deadline I thought, “Why not, there will only be at maximum three people seeing and judging it, and if I don’t get through at least I would have tried”.
You know the sound the IPhone makes when you get an email? They all made me nervous and I was so anxious to know if I would get to volunteer or not. Finally I received an email saying I was accepted, and I couldn’t be any happier. I read through it and it said I was stationed to work at Euroclub. I applied to work all night shifts and I also got to work almost all nights in two weeks.
Before Eurovision kicked off, we had an educational day and a volunteer-dinner-party. During the educational event we learnt about safety, how to deal with fire, how to act if someone gets injured and also about the need to have environmental thinking. We also had dinner at the EuroClub with performances from stand-ins (Sweden, Denmark and Ukraine). We got some previews of the postcards that no one else had seen before and also played some Eurovision related competitions. The night finished off with the dance floor and a party.
The weeks went fast and soon it was time to go, since I would be working night shifts I turned around my days. Some of the nights I had a hotel room booked other nights I went home with train (2,5 hours).
My job at EuroClub was rotating around the different spots that we needed to guard, some hidden doors, VIP bar entrance, stage and of course the main entrance were we had to check bags and pockets so the people coming in don’t bring anything that wasn’t allowed.
While guarding doors I got to see a lot of the artists perform on the main stage; Sweden, Montenegro (my favourite) and more, mixed up with some Melodifestivalen artist like Timoteij, Janet Leon and Marie Serneholt.
I got the chance to hang out with a friend at the press centre and being a part of their livestream, I saw all the artists from distance and took pictures/met personally with some of them. Amongst the Eurovision artist I also got to see other celebrities like Carola, Thomas G:son and sitting together with Christer Björkman at five am in a hotel lobby.
I also got the chance to help at the opening ceremony, standing behind the press and helping those who needed anything.
As volunteers we also got to sit for one final rehearsal, I chose to watch semi-final 1 and I also had tickets to the final. After the final I went back to the EuroClub and had fun amongst artists, press and all other people who were a part of Eurovision and of course seeing Emmelie De Forest preform the winning song.
I can honestly say that I had the best job as a volunteer; I got to meet the artists, producers, and press while sharing this experience with some amazing volunteers with the same interest. If you’re thinking or ever have the chance to apply as a volunteer at Eurovision, do it. You can always refuse but I can honestly say these two weeks were the best of my life and my interest for Eurovision grew even more.
That was a short summary of my experience as a volunteer at Eurovision. I hope you get to be as lucky as me to meet some amazing friends and people.
[vsw id=”RVS-_gzPuTE” source=”youtube” width=”600″ height=”300″ autoplay=”no”]An interview with one of my team leaders (the guy) + one of the girls i worked with (brown haired girl).
