The cancer was diagnosed earlier this year. The surgery followed almost immediately. Then came the chemo. Between the diagnoses and the need for chemo came an offer to volunteer at the media tribune for the swimming competitions in the La Defense Arena, where Taylor Swift had performed to more than a full house just weeks before the Olympics got underway.

Delhi resident and an ardent athletics fan Anasuya Mathur, who has even seen the filming and production of some bits of the Usain Bolt documentary while volunteering at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, was absolutely adamant that there was no way she was going to miss the Paris Olympics.

“The first doctor I consulted for my chemo said I couldn’t take a two-week break to go to Paris to volunteer for the Olympics. He asked me to change my plans, so I changed my doctor. The next one I went to, I told him exactly what I wanted from him apart from the chemo. He mulled over it and presented a schedule for chemo that allowed me to attend and volunteer for about one and a half weeks for the Olympics. So, I happily went with him,” said Mathur sipping on a glass of white wine at a Parisian cafe near Centre Pompidou in the trendy La Marais neighbourhood.

Mathur has volunteered at the athletics venue for all the summer Olympics since London 2012 except in the Covid-hit Tokyo Games. She ideally wanted to be at the Stade de France involved in all the athletics action but her Olympics manager whom she has worked with every four years since London 2012 was working at the swimming venue and she chose to work with her.

While she has enjoyed watching new heroes emerge in the pool and the swimming competitions, some of the dead rubber water polo games have been difficult to get through. She would have loved to watch Neeraj Chopra in the javelin final on Thursday, August 8, but she has to be back in Delhi that morning for blood tests and the next round of chemo the following day. But 10 days of being in the thick of Olympics action is better than none at all.

Read Also: Humans of Olympics: Ex-tennis player who is trying to take more Indian athletes to the Olympics