Fort Simpson (Mar 20/98) - Shannon Swartzentruber will soon be sharing her Olympic memories of a lifetime with students across the region.

The popular 18-year-old recently returned from a trip to the Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan. She was one of seven Canadians chosen by the Canadian Olympic Association to represent Canada at the 1998 Snowlets Camp, an international youth camp held in conjunction with the Games.

She is currently waiting for about 250 pictures she snapped in Japan to come back from developing. Once that happens, she will be on the road, telling students in various Deh Cho communities all about her once-in-a-lifetime trip.

"I'll be doing a slide show," she says. "I have so many things I can present and talk about... I met so many interesting people."

Afterall, there are few of us who can talk about the time we sat with figure-skating legend Elvis Stojko and watched Canada and the US slug it out in hockey; or, the time an Olympic gold medallist showed off his snowboarding and surfing magazines to you while on a plane, or, all the people you met at the Olympic village.

Swartzentruber also said she learned a great deal during the time she spent overseas billeted with a Japanese family.

"I tried all their food," she says. "They're a very traditional family. They said they felt very close to Canada now. I wouldn't be surprised if they came (to the Deh Cho) to visit."

She also said she hopes she can return to a future Olympics now that she's had a taste of this legendary event.

"I really want to (return)," she says. "In the youth camp, a lot of the friends I met are planning to go again."