Teen Life: fighting for the flame

Lavanya Malhotra gets into the spirit of the Olympic Games.

I had a photo taken today that I'm quite proud of. I'm standing straight, eyes blazing with what I like to think is a burning determination, arms raised high above my head grasping the Olympic torch. No, it isn't an overpriced replica I bought from a souvenir shop, but the real torch that was lit in the temple of Hera in Greece and will travel 8,000 miles across Europe and the UK before the 2012 Olympic Games begin in London.

I would love to tell everyone that I was one of the 8,000 inspirational people who were picked to carry the torch. However, the truth is that I stood in a queue filled with families and young people shuffling their feet in the Lloyds TSB bank in Cambridge, England. I was waiting for my chance to carry it and be part of history - along with a hundred others - while an official photographer frantically clicked away on a camera.

All of the UK is in a state of frenzied excitement about the games; national pride is on a high, with Union Jacks adorning everything from iced biscuits to toilet brushes. The torch was passing through Cambridge, not far from where we're staying on holiday, and it was too tempting a chance to miss. You can't switch on the TV here in the UK without seeing the mass celebrations occurring everywhere the torch goes.

In Cambridge, there was a massive fête in a field in honour of the Olympics; you could try your hand at a machine that churned out special-edition Olympics-themed engraved, flattened pennies.

The teenagers, meanwhile, were flocking to the "collector's item" Coke bottles being doled out - aluminium yellow-and-green affairs instead of the usual red ones. Now, how could you resist that? Bit ironic for a fizzy drink to be the most popular freebie at an event to do with sport and fitness.

Waiting for the cauldron to be lit by the torch, the MC kept yelling: "I can see that you are so excited, give us a cheer!" only to be greeted with a sea of stony stiff upper lips. Attempts to initiate a Mexican wave died quickly, although as more young people filled the grounds, the decibel levels steadily increased with each daredevil act of gymnastics or cycling. Two enthusiastic young men with the improbable names of Twist and Pulse danced fairly energetically, although losing the plot a little in a brief reconstruction of the Titanic scene where the tragic couple throw their arms out wide on the ship deck (only Twist and Pulse, happily, lost their balance and plopped into the sea).

Talking to Lee Welch, a member of the Great Britain wheelchair basketball team, he described how heartening it is that the Paralympics are getting a better name and are more eagerly anticipated than ever. He has a simple but powerful message for teenagers wanting to go for gold: "If there's anything you want to do, don't let anything hold you back. Never give less than 110 per cent."