What I Learned Today - Recap of the Olympic Hiccups

25th August 2008

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Recap of the Olympic Hiccups

Well that went smoothly - no significant environmental problems, no catastrophic protests, and no terrorist attacks, as many had predicted. However, there were some hiccups at the Beijing Olympics. I kept a running count of them:

Opening Ceremony: fireworks were digitally enhanced.
Opening Ceremony: Child singer was lip syncing because the real singer was not “very cute”
Opening Ceremony: Games organizers launched 1,110 cloud-seeding missiles shot from 21 areas surrounding Beijing before the opening ceremony. The missiles contained silver iodide which caused rain in those areas rather than over the Bird’s Nest.
Underage Gymnasts: He Kexin, Yang Yilin, Jiang Yuyuan are all disputably underage. The IOC instructed the FIG to look into the gymnasts ages, but I haven’t heard much since.
Media Coverage: China roughs up media coverage of protests.
The Dedication of the Synchronized swimmers – While watching synchronized swimming, the announcers described team China’s training: the athletes are removed from their homes at age 12 and are sent to live at the training facility. Their lives revolve around the sport, and they receive education at the facility. The announcer described the story of one athlete who asked for the weekend off. Her coach asked her why she needed the weekend off: Because she hadn’t seen her family in 12 years. “That’s true dedication to her sport, to go that long without seeing her family” gushed the announcer. Dedication?!
American Death: The first happened during the first day of the Olympics. The father-in-law of the Men’s Indoor Volleyball Coach was stabbed at noon at the Drum Tower, a popular tourist site.
Another American Death: The other death actually happened prior to the Olympics, on August 4 but was mysteriously covered up. A woman, an Olympic volunteer from Chicago, fell down manhole on the sidewalk and died. Who removed the manhole? Over 24,000 manholes were stolen from the streets of Beijing and sold to scrap metal dealers trying to meet increased demand during the Olympic building boom. During the Olympics, another volunteer posted the details of the woman’s death in a blog. That post was replaced within a few hours with a benign description. Authorities claimed she had fallen from a train or fallen through the roof of a building.
Mr. Tang: A journalist ran a story last week about land disputes going on in Beijing. She immediately received menacing phone calls from a man refusing to identify himself other than Tang (“you haven’t met me, but you know what I do”) who demanded to know where the journalist lives and who were the people profiled in the story.
One World One Dream: I’d say this photo depicts the situation best.
More Gold Medals than the US?!