Gecko Swim Gala

The Gecko Swim Gala is an event organized by my service, Gecko Inc., which aim to raise funds to support the kids in our service by providing some equipment such as goggles and more.

As a leader of the Gecko Inc. service, I volunteered to be part of the support team of the event by helping with timing as well as marshaling and encouraging swimmers. My role was to write down the times of each swimmer and to organize the movement of the support team. For example by moving everyone to the other side of the pool if the race was 25m.

We started Saturday 27 of April at 8am with our young gecko swimmers. They raced against each other in every swims: breaststroke, backstroke, freestyle and even butterfly and on different distances such as 25m, 50m, and 100m, sometimes mixed and sometimes only boys or girls. The wild range of possibilities brought diversity by making every race different from the previous one. After this, it was time for the fun relay mixed team and then the special relay for adults. As there were still places for the special relay, a part of the support team, Ayanna, Anae, Olau, and I participated in the relay. We finished 2nd out of 6! By the way, the special relay consists of a 50m race with any type of swim the swimmer is comfortable with.

At the end of the day, this event allowed us to raise the amount of 23,000 LKR, which is more than I personally expected and will allow us to do many things for the kids in our service.

Overall, even though it was particularly hot, I enjoyed being part of the team to support the event. Also, seeing that the kids were all excited to race against each other was really enjoyable. I never really supported any event like this before so it was really a new experience for me and a good opportunity to try something new.