On Friday, July 27 we got rejected from our first official Olympic event. We were turned away at the gate when we arrived for a preliminary round of archery at Lord's Cricket Ground. The event is listed as "un-ticketed" on the website, which many took to mean that it was open to the public if you arrived early enough.

Our group of 30 students left the flat at 6:30 a.m. and took the tube to Lord's. We were the first in the queue when we arrived and we were thrilled! We have already queued at Wimbledon, where we were somewhere between 4,500 and 5,000 people back. Arriving to an empty line was the best we could have hoped for.

Unfortunately, the event was not open to the public. The volunteers were friendly and apologetic, but explained that this round of archery was only open to journalists. We took our rejection in stride and went home to take a nap. A few hours later we turned on the news and found that we were not alone. Many people had been turned away at Lord's and it was a top story on the BBC! We didn't make the news, but we did enjoy hearing about others just like us who attempted a day of archery and were turned away.

Luckily, we do have actual tickets for several events including men's and women's football, beach volleyball and diving.

Lord's Cricket Ground in London, England. Photo by Susie Salem