OC Great Park Ambassador

Time 2021-11-17 23:10:31

Web Name: OC Great Park Ambassador

WebSite: http://ocgp.blogspot.com

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This is the blog of an Orange County Great Park (OCGP) Ambassador. OCGP is the first great metropolitan park of the 21st century. It's size is 1,347 acres, almost twice that of Central Park, NY. The first distinctive feature of the park, symbolizing its location in Orange County, is one of the world's largest helium passenger balloons: an orange Aerophile balloon. The Preview Park demonstrates features that will be a part of OCGP.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008 Goodbye, Au Revoir!The pictures from the Hapa performance night are now available and while the building of the Park will continue, the concerts finale is this coming weekend, and my Ambassador stint along with summer is over! Melissa, the Ambassador Coordinator informed us, the Ambassadors, last week, that today was her last day. I've now sent in my final report and that I guess, along with the last post, marks the end of the Great Summer 2008 OCGP Ambassador adventure. Unless somebody wants me to continue to blog - which I'd love to do!

I did a lot more presentations in September when I booked the Community Room (again) at the Heritage Park Library - pictures here show how I set the room up. I had company, an Ambassador colleague - Marissa, on Sept. 8 but on Sept. 9 I went solo. I/we presented to new residents to Irvine, community college students; free lance researchers, traveling businessmen on lunch breaks, families using the library, as well some of the students in the Homework Kids Club. One of the neat things about these presentations was the opportunity to interact with kids - school, pre-school, and college. Often, the pre-schoolers drew their parents in - the parents seemed to think we were 'selling' something or the balloon rides have a cost! Plus, the young definitely have a different take on the park - for e.g. one of the questions was regarding free wi-fi access at the park, will have the Park have it? I didn't know the answer to the question, but given the number of hours I've spent blogging my Ambassador experience, it would be great to have wi-fi at the Park - then I could blog onsite!

My blog statistics - in the last one month, 22 Aug - 23 Sept. there's been 192 page loads, 82 unique visitors and 23 returning visitors - are pretty encouraging to me. I have done almost nothing to attract or improve traffic to it (definitely no search engine optimization or anything of the sort). I also forgot to share with friends :(. Most people who found it (and I've gotten a few emails!) are community folks, park visitors, and presentation attendees whose pictures I took and put on my blog. I forgot to monitor traffic too and not until Melissa wanted to know did I think of implementing a counter in late Aug. So that's why there's only one month of statistics. Emails indicated that folks appreciated the blog 1) as they got to see their pictures, 2) watch a video of the Flight Crew in performance (like me a few simply missed seeing them when they visited the park), 3) understand many principles that drives the programming and design, and 4) get a sneak peek into the workings of both the City of Irvine volunteer program as well as the OC Great Park (especially to high schoolers and community members who were considering volunteering or working with them). Thanks to the City of Irvine and the OCGP for this opportunity to be an Ambassador. Goodbye everybody, and I look forward to seeing you around Irvine!Posted byAnitaat2:34 PMNo comments: Monday, September 1, 2008 OCGP NeighborhoodsAt the Aug. 15 Hapa performance event (about which I've yet to post and share pictures) I noticed that the Great Park Neighborhoods folks were out there collecting raffle entries and upon receipt of those precious names and address (their future mailing list) distributing distinctive green bags with the bike logo. It does look like they are going to be breaking ground in September and building a few new homes! At our Open Great Park Presentations in the Library, Melissa and I chatted with a lot of families who were moving in or just recently moved into Irvine and looking to buy. We referred them to the Great Park Neighborhoods website but I was thinking I should also suggest the Irvine Housing blog as they might have more information and insight about the development of these new homes and neighborhoods.Posted byAnitaat7:53 PM2 comments: Wednesday, August 27, 2008 Presentations at Heritage Regional Park LibraryOn Thursday, Aug. 28, 2008, from 12 noon until 5:00 pm, the Ambassadors will be doing a series of Great Park presentations to the community at large at the Irvine Heritage Park (aka Heritage Regional Park) Library. Everybody is invited. The presentation will be about 20 minutes long with time for in-depth Q three generations of America's folk music dynasty." Sadly, the song I best remember is an Arlo Guthrie song performed by another singer: City of New Orleans. Perhaps I'll get to hear and see the original version performance.Posted byAnitaat11:02 PMNo comments: Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Salsa and Hula on Aug. 22-23This coming weekend at the Great Park will be one to remember. "LAs best salsa band horns, vibes, vocals, everything" Johnny Polanco y Conjunto Armistad will play for dancing enthusiasts on friday, Aug. 22. Then, on Saturday Hapa will take you out of this world! Hapa, technically means half - CNN's Betty Nguyen discusses Hapa identity in the video to help us understand 'hapa' intellectually and then enjoy Hapa's Lei Pikake and their very own version of Redemption Song. Your invitation to Night Flights 2008, which gives all the details of OC Great Park summer programming here. See you there!Posted byAnitaat3:58 PM1 comment: Saturday, August 16, 2008 Flight Crew VideoMy pictures from the Thank You Dinner have been uploaded and here is the Flight Crew video I took too, yesterday. Apologies for the rather low resolution/quality as I recorded it with my digital camera!

Posted byAnitaat12:52 PMNo comments: Friday, August 15, 2008 Thank You Dinner for Festival of Flight AmbassadorsI'm just back from a thank you dinner and balloon flight hosted by Melissa, our Ambassador Coordinator, for all of us who volunteered at the Festival of Flight (and our spouses). We had a lovely evening together, first at the Hangar Cafe and later hanging around the park and waiting for our balloon flight. Our dinner was at 7:00 pm and we all got to meet Melissa's husband and their son. Besides the food, goodies, great conversation, balloon ride and humor-filled award certificate that Melissa gave us, I got two unexpected and additional treats. I was able to watch the dance instructors, who are present on Friday dance nights, dancing impromptu with Park visitors, and the Flight Crew (how I missed them at the HONK performance night I don't know!) performed for us as were waiting for our Balloon flight. By the time our flight was over we'd been two hours in the park; I was a bit reluctant to leave the Mike McCaffrey Trio but I didn't want to overdo my first night out again :). There was a very dramatic looking full moon hanging spectacularly behind the dance floor and musicians' stage. I remembered to take pictures of our evening and even a video of the Flight Crew performing for us. I'll upload them shortly. Another lovely event at the Great Park!Posted byAnitaat9:40 PMNo comments: Older PostsHomeSubscribe to:Posts (Atom)Have you visited the Great Park this summer?Blog Archive 2008(20) July(8) August(10) September(2)OCGP NeighborhoodsGoodbye, Au Revoir!License
OC Great Park Ambassador Blog by Anita Coleman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at ocgp.blogspot.com.Related websitesAmbassadors, Summer 2008, Photo AlbumOrange County Great ParkGreat Park BalloonGreat Park NeighborhoodsThe Legacy Project (Burchfield (artist) Gallery)OC Register's Great Park websiteEl Toro Info SiteGreat Metropolitan ParksBalboa Park (San Diego)Central Park (NY)Grant Park (Chicago)Griffith Park (LA)Open Air MuseumsSkansen (Stockholm, Sweden)Norsk FolkMuseum (Bygdøy, Norway)Suomenlinna (Sveaborg, Finland)GP Articles in NewspapersBalloon begins night flights (OC Register, 18 July 2008)Great Park preview a crowd please (OC Register, 12 July 2008)Preview Park (LA Times, 10 July, 2008)Festival of Flight (OC Register 3 July 2008)OC Register's Great Park InteractiveGreat Park offers little (OC Register, 3 June 2008)Subscribe to OCGP blogPosts Atom PostsAll Comments Atom All Comments

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