Jamaicanly Victorious

If there were a word to adequately describe a feeling way above excitement - that's the word I would use to portray the mood in Jamaica House tonight. I've checked my thesaurus and there isn't anything in the English language that stretches that far. There's been points during the evening where I thought the whole venue might blast off the ground, ripping through the side of The O2 out into the stars.

For anyone living on planet earth at the moment it wouldn't be hard to guess why Jamaica House is metaphorically on fire. Amid the British jubilation of six gold medals yesterday - the best sporting night for Britain I can remember - today has also been a day of humongous proportions for Jamaica.

The day started off rainy - so rainy we had to ask a man outside the Olympic Park to give us a couple of his plastic bags to create a pair of makeshift raincoats. What all these athletes from hot countries think of the temperamental British weather I have no idea. Some of them, dressed in their brightly coloured tracksuits whilst dodging the puddles didn't look too impressed this morning. But as though someone were tinkering with the weather settings the clouds did lift and the sun was out by the evening.

Jamaica House was brimful of cool guests today such as a few member's of Usain Bolt's family who came here from where they live in Bristol to watch the games. His cousin Vinette Jones said that Usain in real life is just as you would expect him to be, just as lively as he comes across on camera. She also mentioned that he likes to play PlayStation. Well, that's cool. He definitely looked like a lively guy as he pointed at the camera and did a funny hand gesture before the final.

I also met a guy called Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones who, despite his very British sounding name is one of the the only black farmers in Britain, hence the name of his company - 'Black Farmer'. He was born in Jamaica and has a lovely farm in Devon. We also went along to visit a Jamaican chef Andrew Mackintosh who does authentic Jamaican food and has cooked for stars such as Shaggy and Bob Marley. He gave us some delicious food including, unexpectedly enough, cow's foot. We also stumbled upon Timmy Mallet of all people!

The High Commissioner was also at Jamaica House today. An interesting thing she said was that a new word has recently been coined and that word is 'jamaicanly'. It's an adjective, I'm guessing kind of like 'manly' or 'heavenly' and it apparently means being small but doing everything with style and class, being unafraid to punch above one's weight. I guess you could say it would be jamaicanly to form a bobsled team in a country with no snow. Apparently jamaicanly is being added to the dictionary soon.

Moment of the day? Well... I guess that would have to be when Usain Bolt (who happens to be Jamaican) took gold and Yohan Blake (who also happens to be Jamaican) took silver in the 100m sprint. What can I say? An unforgettable moment. The whole place just about erupted. I'm just surprised Jamaica House managed to stay rooted to the ground!