Traffic. Heat. Crowds.
Atlantans mobbing the newly opened Centennial Olympic Park on Sunday said they don't care about the problems that come with hosting the 1996 Summer Games.Even though the streets around the park were in gridlock, the humidity was nearly as high as the temperature and there were lines everywhere, including outside the portable toilets.
And the Olympics don't even start until Friday.
"Some folks in Atlanta seem to make such a big deal about the problems," Anthony Pace said as he and his wife, Norma, toured the park. "We're here. We'd better enjoy it."
Pace, who'll be downtown every day as an Olympic volunteer, suggested Utahns concerned about the effects of the 2002 Winter Games "look at (what) you're getting instead of focusing on two or three weeks of hassles."
Kim Minors, an insurance adjuster and Georgia State University student, agreed the difficulties are worth the benefits. Especially the opportunity to meet people from all over the world.
Her advice for Utahns? "Welcome it. Embrace the cultural diversity of it. You're going to meet people from all over the world. Don't be small-minded," Minors said.
And be flexible. She crammed an eight-week quarter into six weeks to finish her business degree before the Georgia State campus closed to get ready for its Games role as an Olympic venue.
"You've just got to go with it. There's not much you can do," Mary Ann Adamczyk said. She said she's decided to enjoy herself during the Games "instead of trying to fight it."
Six-year-old Tyler Carr said Utahns should know that having an Olympics in your own back yard is great. Besides a visit to his school by Izzy, the Games mascot, Carr got to run through the Fountain of Rings at the park.
Visitors are encouraged to cool off in the ground-level fountain that shoots sprays of water from 250 jets shaped like the Olympic rings into the air at regular intervals.
The park is Atlanta's most visible reward for putting up with the Summer Games, which are expected to double the city's population through closing ceremonies on Aug. 4.
The 21-acre site in the heart of downtown, home to blocks of rundown buildings until March 1995, was built by Olympic organizers as a public gathering place during the Games.
Post-Olympics, the park is expected to boost efforts to develop downtown into a place to live as well as work. New lofts are already being advertised a few blocks away on Peachtree Street.
The park was dedicated by Olympic officials on Saturday, and it's been jammed ever since. Many of the visitors are Atlantans who couldn't wait for a taste of the Olympics.
They got it. Parking lots, usually closed on Sundays, were getting $10 a car. Small cups of soft frozen lemonade sold on street corners for $2. Bottled water went for up to $2.50.
With members of the International Olympic Committee as well as athletes from many of the 197 countries competing in the Games already in town, a small army of police, soldiers and black-bereted corrections officers are on patrol.
Not everything is Olympic-ready. Construction crews are still working on the House of Blues, a celebrity-owned club located across the park that's set to open this week.
Last-minute repairs are being made to side streets, and booths selling drinks, fast food and souvenirs seem to be springing up on every available space of sidewalk.