For the Milan Cortina Winter Games, organizers have relied on a large volunteer presence that reaches far beyond a single venue or single shift. The Associated Press reports that about 18,000 volunteers are spread across northern Italy, blanketing the venues in navy blue uniforms and helping keep events running around the clock.
The AP spoke with three Italian women volunteering at the Games, each describing a return shaped by earlier work at the Turin Olympics and by the personal changes that came afterward. For Romagnoli, volunteering in the mountains west of Turin in 2006 meant being assigned to support athletes from Ireland, a role that she said put her on the move for nearly a full day and helped leave her with long-lasting souvenirs from the experience.
Romagnoli, now 45 and volunteering in Milan at the short-track speedskating venue, said her work this time could involve practical help such as assisting with clothes or maintenance for the venue’s protection cushions. She also framed the experience as something she wanted her daughters to carry forward, saying she hoped they would “breathe what is really the Olympic spirit, the Olympic sports values,” and adding that they could participate “either in my place or together with me.”
Frisina, 70, described a different path back to the Games. She said she volunteered in Turin when she was 50, after feeling trapped in a cycle between work and home, and the AP reports that she returned to Milan now as an usher. Her current duties include helping people find their seats at the women’s ice hockey arena in the Milan suburbs, and she said she uses video chats with her 5-year-old grandson between shifts to tell him about the people she has met.
The AP reports that Frisina joined a volunteer alumni group after Turin and has continued to give her time across Italy over the subsequent two decades, including at last year’s Vatican Jubilee and at Eurovision in 2022. She said talking to tourists from different countries has broadened her horizons, telling the AP, “I have visited all the world.”
Azzalin said Olympic volunteering also brought personal life changes. The AP reports that she worked for the local organizing committee as a sport director assistant between 2001 and 2003 ahead of the 2006 Turin Games, and that during preparations she found romance with a colleague. She described it as a marriage built around the Olympic moment, saying, “I think that Olympic Games is a very good Tinder,” before her planning shifted from preparations to family.
After leaving the organizing committee, Azzalin took a temporary job with Visa to continue working around the Olympics, and she later volunteered again for Milan Cortina. The AP says she is 53 and has worked at the Olympic Village in Milan, assembling chairs and helping athletes sort trash and recycling in the Village’s cafeteria, while her husband stayed home.
The AP’s reporting also describes how these women’s earlier experiences have translated into the kind of day-to-day support needed for the Games. Together, their accounts reflect how the Milan Cortina Olympics’ logistics—directions, hospitality, venue support and help in the Olympic Village—depend on volunteers who return not just for a single event, but for a longer relationship with the Games and the people around them.