Video: South American Games in Medellin, Colombia · Global Voices
Juliana Rincón Parra

These past two weeks were full of sport activities and celebration in Medellin, Colombia while the city hosted the IX South American Games (ODESUR) where different Latin American countries competed for medals in a variety of sports.  Locals and visitors paused their routines to visit the facilities and watch the games. Following are some of the videos they made, showing how each of them experienced the games.
Carlos Esteban Orozco had the opportunity to be at the opening ceremony. In his four minute video, we follow him as he shows up to the ceremony, sits and waits for a few hours until it begins, highlighting parts of the spectacle and ending with the firework display that lit the city sky.
Lully was also at the opening ceremonies but she saw a different side than Carlos Orozco: as she arrived at the stadium, she saw workers organized in a protest demanding fairer salaries and decent jobs. She interviewed some of the athletes and then proceeded to walk to the improvised seating for those who didn't manage to get inside the venues: sitting outside, watching through the fences. The games, although meant for everyone, didn't really benefit the whole population.
A similar experience was lived by Ana Vallejo and Juan David Escobar who tried to watch the games, but found out that they had to be there 3 hours in advance to get a seat. So they walked around the new sport facilities and peeped in through the perforated walls before heading back home. Here is their video:
Diana Perez, however, didn't have much trouble getting into the game venues. Her trick? Getting there early. She managed to get into several sporting events:
Lina11co was at the Closing Ceremony, and following is the video she made at the open air ceremony, where you can see the acrobat troupe hanging from a metallic structure suspended from a crane, many meters above the audience:
If you wish to watch the opening and closing ceremonies, the complete videos by regional TV channel TeleMedellin are online.
Disclosure: Some of the videos on this post were filmed for an episode of  Todo lo que hay,  a webshow in which I am involved.