The athletes have gained our respect in ways we can only hope will endure

For a fortnight, there has been an amnesty on our less attractive qualities, writes Rosita Boland.

For a fortnight, there has been an amnesty on our less attractive qualities, writes Rosita Boland.

Walking home during the week and turning into the enclave of cottages where I live, I noticed several of my neighbours, also on their way home, wearing the green and red shirts of Special Olympics volunteers.

I could see them noticing each other, and saluting, stopping to swop stories of where they'd been posted.

Then we all opened our different doors and went inside. It made me realise that people, literally on my own doorstep, had come out to participate in Special Olympics; that the same thing has happened all over the country for the last fortnight. Something special happened on a national scale.

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Out and about at venues all week, talking to athletes, coaches and families, they repeated a few things over and over again.

The welcome they had got in Ireland.

The fantastic times they had had in host towns.

How they wanted to stay in their host towns forever.

How organised everything was.

How many ad hoc acts of kindness had been shown to them.

How friendly and helpful and endlessly welcoming everyone had been; was being.

It's the duty of a journalist to be sceptical. Hearing how welcoming and friendly we are is the equivalent of finding your pint of Guinness has been marked with a shamrock by the barman; those comments and that pint are meant for someone else. Someone not Irish. Someone who believes in clichés.

Not us. We're not like that all the time, or even most of the time, I felt like saying to the people who told me those things. Oh no. We're selfish and rude and materialistic and if you come back to Ireland again as a tourist, we'll rip you off - left, right and centre.

But, for a fortnight at least, there has been an amnesty on our less attractive qualities. People have put on volunteer shirts and thought about something other than themselves.

People living in host towns have turned out to welcome delegations from all round the world.

Money has been raised. Stories of personal dedication emerge everywhere.

A newly-married couple spent the first week of their married life volunteering at the RDS.

An anonymous donor gave the Argentinian cyclists new bikes when their own were damaged beyond repair in transit.

A university student spent the day waiting for her final results, not lying low at home or on campus, but acting as Russian translator for the volleyball team at ALSAA.

A bus driver on the Lepoardstown route handed back fares to family members of athletes when he found out who they were.

Children came in thousands to support teams at venues, shouting for countries it is likely many are only hearing of for the first time, and for athletes, the like of whom they wouldn't have seen before and whose autographs they were queuing up for.

Perhaps Ireland really was a good choice for the 2003 World Games. Because if the Games are not about something, they're not about winning.

And we know all about that. We've indulged ourselves for a long time about being good losers.

It's our international trademark as supporters.

The athletes we've been watching since they arrived here a fortnight ago are familiar with being at the losing end of luck in life.

They have gained our admiration and respect in ways which we can only hope will endure past their departure from our country and its erstwhile Cead mile fáiltes.