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04.08.2016
Latvijas Pasts has solemnly passed the ball of good wishes for the Latvian Olympians to the Latvian Olympic Committee (LOC), to deliver it to the venue of the thirty-first Summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro. The ball contains at least 1000 good wishes - altogether about 400 metres of colourful ribbons containing good wishes to the Olympic team from Positivus visitors, ministers, customers of the post office Sakta, employees of companies and ministries and others.
When passing the ball to the President of the LOC Aldons Vrubļevskis and General Secretary Žoržs Tikmers, the Chairman of the Board of Latvijas Pasts Mārcis Vilcāns emphasised that he was honoured to pass the well wishes to the Latvian Olympic team in the name of Latvijas Pasts and the many supporters, hoping that the good words will inspire the athletes for great performances.
When wishing good luck to the Latvian Olympians M. Vilcāns referred to the “concentrated, yet very deep message” from Maestro Raimonds Pauls: “Be strong!” and emphasised: “Thank you all for adding your good luck wishes to the ball - these are tens of companies, institutions, organisations, municipalities and hundreds of individuals. Let the many good luck wishes bring strength to our Olympians!”
Both A. Vrubļevskis and Ž. Tikmers appreciated the initiative of the ball of good wishes, and the representatives of the LOC have added their greetings and promised to find the best moment during the games to unwind the ball together with the Latvian team and read all of the wishes.
The ball of good wishes for the Latvian Olympians was started in July during the 10th
Positivus festival in Salacgrīva, where over 300 greetings were wound together; later it was continued in the post office Sakta and by several travelling balls of good wishes among Latvian companies, institutions, municipalities, organisations and individuals. The supporters include the Cabinet of Ministers, the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Justice, the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs, the Road Traffic Safety Directorate, Riga Motor Museum, Statoil, business university Turība, Swedbank, LMT, Junior Achievement Latvija, Ziedot.lv, rehabilitation centre Poga, Cēsis Municipality, Latvian Olympic Committee, Latvian Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation, Latvian Luge Federation, Latvian Skiing Association, AirBaltic, Lattelecom, airport Rīga, Sportland, Madara Cosmetics, 220.lv, SEB, Amoralle, Maxima, Moller Auto and others.
Ministers, employees of ministries, companies and organizations and, for example, Raimonds Pauls, Andrejs Ērglis, Guntis Ulmanis, Renārs Zeltiņš, Dons and others have added their good wishes to the ball.
The greetings were very different, but generally they included wishes of luck and strength in the coming Olympics: for example, Raimonds Pauls “Be strong!”, the Minister of Finance Dana Reizniece-Ozola “Those who persevere after all their strength is gone, become champions. Persevere!”, the Ministry of Transport “We wish you success and victory!”, Swedbank “Health, vigor and inspiration, of course!” etc.
There is a special website dedicated to the ball of good luck wishes http://sveicieniuzrio.lv/, which lists the received greetings and shows an interactive map of the road of the balls of greetings, as well as pictures from the writing process in various places.
There are 34 athletes in the Latvian Olympic team approved for participation in Rio de Janeiro in 13 disciplines: track and field, BMX and road cycling, freestyle wrestling, kayaking and canoeing, judo, tennis, beach volleyball, weightlifting, swimming, sailing and shooting. The list of Latvian Olympians is found here.
The 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro will be the thirty-first Summer Olympic Games and will take place from 5 August to 21 August. It is planned that about 12 500 athletes from 205 countries will participate.
About SJSC Latvijas Pasts
Latvijas Pasts ensures the widest availability of postal services throughout Latvia by maintaining more than 600 post offices. The primary function of the company is provision of the universal postal service; Latvijas Pasts also provides commercial transport, express mail, payment, press subscription, retail and philatelic services. Latvijas Pasts is a wholly State-owned company with more than 4,200 employees. The quality measurements of Latvijas Pasts domestic mail deliveries are regularly conducted by TNS Latvia, one of the leading market, social and media research agencies in Latvia. In turn, the quality measurements of the cross-border deliveries are provided within the framework of the International Post Corporation through the intermediary of the research companies TNS, Ipsos and Quotas.
Additional information:
Gundega Vārpa
Public Relations Specialist
Tel.: +371 67608505
E-mail: pr@pasts.lv; gundega.varpa@pasts.lv
facebook.com/latvijas.pasts; twitter.com/latvijas_pasts