Chiet (32), the former Dunedin Technical stalwart, joined New Zealand Football in July as the organisation's high performance manager.
Four months later, he was in the stands at Westpac Stadium watching the All Whites beat Bahrain 1-0 in a World Cup qualifier.
Now, he finds himself boarding a plane for South Africa to attend the 2010 World Cup draw and find out who the All Whites are playing.
"It's been overwhelming. It's very hard to put into words what the last few weeks have been like," Chiet told the Otago Daily Times.
"It's actually been very humbling. We've had so many messages and so much support coming from avenues you wouldn't have expected.
"It's great for New Zealand football to be in the media spotlight for a few weeks."
Chiet has flown to South Africa with two members of the great 1982 All Whites squad - New Zealand Football chairman Frank van Hattum and All Whites assistant coach Brian Turner.
The group will be eager onlookers tomorrow morning (NZ time) when the Fifa bigwigs draw names out of glass bowls to find the eight pools for the World Cup.
"It's going to be an incredibly exciting occasion," Chiet said.
"I'm hoping we'll get one or two of the lesser teams so we have a good chance of getting through to the second stage.
"But the little boy in me probably wants to see England in our group. That would be pretty special."
Chiet knows the excitement of preparing for - and then playing in - the World Cup for a second time will sustain New Zealand football for a while.
But his job is also to ensure the moment is not a flash in the pan, that the opportunity to grow the game is not wasted and the millions of dollars that pour in are not frittered away.
"We're very much looking at how to make the most of this opportunity and the resources that are going to come in.
"It's really exciting to think we could set the blueprint for where football can go in New Zealand."
One move that everybody assumes will happen is a link with Asia at the top level.
The theory is the All Whites would be better playing tough games against Asian nations and Australia on a regular basis, even if it would make qualifying for the World Cup again much tougher than staying in the Oceania region.
World Cup Draw
Where: Cape Town, South Africa.
When: Tomorrow, 6am.
TV: Live on TV1 and Sky Sport 1.
How it works: Four pots of eight teams. First pot is top eight seeds; other three pots by geography. One team drawn from each pot to form a pool.
Pot 1 (seeds): South Africa, Argentina, Brazil, England, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain.
Pot 2: Australia, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Honduras, Mexico, USA, New Zealand.
Pot 3: Algeria, Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay.
Pot 4: Denmark, France, Greece, Portugal, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Switzerland.
Potentially toughest All Whites group: Brazil, Cameroon, Portugal.
Potentially weakest All Whites group: South Africa, Algeria, Slovenia.
