Let The Games Begin - Soon

[Leif]

I kinda wish now that I had taken the time to watch, or even DVR'd it.

It may not be too late - try: BBC Sport - London 2012 Olympics - : Opening Ceremony with TV Commentary

[Leif]

....there are no 'incidents' any more serious than the wrong Korean flag.

You probably can't get more serious than Matt's take on that incident...

[StuartR]

It may not be too late - try: BBC Sport - London 2012 Olympics - : Opening Ceremony with TV Commentary

I'm afraid this won't work for Al.

The BBC are not allowed to broadcast any Olympic content outside the UK, there are different official Olympic broadcasters for each country who have paid significant amounts for exclusive broadcasting rights.

I just tested this by configuring a browser to use a proxy in the USA and then connecting to the BBC web site. I saw this

bbc.png

Of course that does imply that if Al used a proxy server in the UK...

[Post=79488 Bigaldoc]

I think the Olympics has to be an experience of a lifetime, regardless of where it's held, for these young kids. (Basketball "professionals" excepted.) Most of them are kids with no international experience or exposure and I can remember when I was 21 and went on my first "overseas" assignment to Turkey. I was awed by the experience and "grew up" a lot in those couple of years.

We have another that my Kentucky compatriots are watching. Young Anthony Davis of the University of Kentucky basketball team is a young boy among all the "pros" on the USA basketball team. He may not get to play much, if at all, but I can only imagine the awe that must be going through his brain right about now.

[Post=79497 Argus]

I think it was a very good opening ceremony, I really enjoyed it. There were lots of wit and humour; I wouldn't expect anything less from the Britons; great. And great music.

Even though I understand it's an experience of a lifetime, I don't understand why many of the athletes use cameras and phones while marching in, but I guess it's typical for these days, it's been like that at a couple of games. Nowadays we don't watch and participate, we look at the action through a camera lens. (I also saw more than one talking on the phone ...; isn't that yesterday? Text with one hand, and wave with the other, if it's so incredibly important. )

I loved the Czechs' outfits; wellingtons (rain rubber boots) and carrying umbrellas.

By the way, good of you Stuart; going with your father; hope both of you will have a great day.

[Post=79500 DaveA]

I have been watching the soccer (football) games and they have been well played.

I noticed that the fan base has been quite lean for the ladies.

Arlo, the NBCSport anoucer even got a plug in for the Seattle Sounders, his former employer. He made commit about one of the US ladies dating, a Seattle Sounder player.

[Bob Phillips]

I wouldn't imagine very many local MERCHANTS saying that. I think they'd like to make a pound or two from a few tourists...

The sailing events are being held in Weymouth near to my area, and the merchants (we call them traders/shopkeepers) there are certainly complaining. The whole of the the seafront has been closed to traffic, as has much of the surrounding areas, so the only way to get into the town centre is to take a £10 park and rid, even if you don't need the park. Unsurprisingly, most people are not bothering, so the shops are down in their business. Couple that with Olympic thought police cracking down hard on anything that smells slightly of unofficial use of the ridiculously wide restrictions (you can't even use 2012), and traders outside of the major commercial sponsors are not seeing the Olympics as a business opportunity. Slight aside - I heard our dumb sports minister yesterday praising McDonalds contribution to helping youngsters participate in sport - what planet is he on?

Hotels and guest houses are also reporting less business because normal clientele are staying well away; this after finding they couldn't sell their over-priced rooms anyway.

As you can guess, I wish we had never bid for the over-bloated event; I wish we had never won it; I hate the way we have succumbed to ridiculous demands by the IOC and allow them to exist in a privileged bubble that constrains the rest of us (why can't they stay in the Olympic village like the athletes, why do they have to stay in Park Lane hotels with free room service and free bar at the British taxpayers's expense?); I can't wait for the farce to be over and we start to honestly admit how much we have lost on the vanities of politicians.

I don't think clotted cream would be associated with London by anybody I know!

But it would be associated with Dorset and Weymouth!

[HansV]

Hi Bob,

I edited the 2nd quote in your reply. This board uses BBCode with a few additions of our own (see Tutorial: BBCodes). Instead of <b>...</b> to make text bold, use [b]...[/b], etc.

[Bob Phillips]

Thanks, I will check it out.

[Post=79525 Argus]

Sheesh, I'm sorry I started this thread.

I can understand that, Al.

[Post=79526 Bigaldoc]

Happens a lot here in The Lounge, Argus. Of 890 members, I do believe there's only a handful of us who really enjoy sporting activities. But I can never resist making a post when there's something "noteworthy" (to me!).

It kinda surprises me, in light the huge popularity of football in Europe and Great Britain. I also noticed some pretty empty seats during the few events I've watched so far. The USA-Colombia match yesterday for example, the seats were mostly empty.

Well, to each his own. I am disappointed for the sake of the shopkeepers in Weymouth. That has to be tough for them to take.

[Post=79528 BobH]

Because I've already expressed my views of what the IOC have made of the Games earlier in this thread, I'll restrain myself except to say that I can certainly understand Bob's (Phillips) comments; and my sympathies lie with the shopkeepers in Weymouth. That being said, I want to relate a story of one of my experiences at the '88 Winter Games in Calgary, AB, CA.

The wife and I won a week at the Games courtesy of one of the international credit card companies. We were treated royally, staying at the Banff Springs Hotel in excellent accommodations. Buses (from all over Canada) were provided - gratis - from any venue to any other venue and among Banff, Calgary and other cities. We had free tickets randomly chosen for us to may events and bartered freely with other attendees to get tickets to events we wanted to see but didn't receive tickets for. We were even given a generous allowance for pocket money to spend as we saw fit. Even in those days, I had to report 5 figures on my income tax return for the gift. There was an hospitality suite open around the clock and breakfast and afternoon tea provided - again gratis. I cannot say enough nice things about how we were received and treated by every Canadian we encountered. It was, as Al said, a great experience. At those Games, the local merchants in Banff fared very well. I cannot speak for what occurred in Calgary because I was only at the Olympic venues. There might have been an effect for good or bad on local merchants.

The story, though, concerns athletes from what was then East Germany. It happened that at one of the venues in the parking lot for buses that we happened upon a group of young athletes from that country. They were snapping pics of each other in groups which meant that one of their number was, perforce, kept from the image. Being able to speak only a smattering of German, I offered to use their cameras (no digicams in those days) to take group shots of all of them. As I was receiving and handing off cameras, an aparatchik appeared and began shouting and berating the youngsters and trying to menace me. I pulled up the camcorder and started shooting footage of him which he disliked immensely. He stepped towards me and I prepared for a physical encounter (I was in my mid 40s then) when several other bystanders stepped toward me making the 'keeper' back away. I continued shooting footage of him even after he entered the bus because he was going up and down the aisle berating the young athletes. Although it seemed strange and interesting at the time, it has become the single most memorable experience of the games for me. The Wall fell only a few years later, but I got a first-hand look at what life in a police state must be like.

The Games are a grand thing for the athletes and for the corporate titans whose money can dominate politicians and the professional sycophants who organize and manage the games, but I must wonder at what cost in so many ways. The excessive expense of the pageantry bothers me, especially in a world economy like the current one, because of what it reveals of human nature and value systems. It is far, far more excessive today than it was for the Games I attended and I thought it excessive even then.

[Post=79529 Argus]

But I can never resist making a post when there's something "noteworthy" (to me!).

You shouldn't, Al.
We had one medal hope today, this evening; Sarah Sjöström in women's 100 m butterfly; this young woman (18) took the gold medal at the 2008 European Championships, just 14 years old. In 2009 she set a world record, 56.44 in the semi-finals, and then improved it to 56.06 in the finals, a couple of weeks before the age of 16. But last year she ended in fourth place several times; and same now, in the semi-finals, and this evening in the final, fourth place, she is usually very good in the finish, but not this time. Still, she was youngest of them all, and has a promising future. Gold medal and a new world record: Dana Vollmer, USA.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/olympics/18904515

[Bob Phillips]

Of 890 members, I do believe there's only a handful of us who really enjoy sporting activities.

I doubt that is so. I for one love sport, and have always participated, I played football, cricket and rugby extensivley when I was younger, and I still run and cycle. No, sport is great, it is just that these big events have superceded the sport with commercial and corporate junkets. They are more about the vanitiies of the IOC, politicians, and big business than they are about sport. Each sport has its own championship, and these are invariably more interesting than the Olympics (except in the case of those that have also outgrown their sporting purpose such as the football world cup). An event where we build stadiums that will be torn down after the close (such as the showjumping facilities at Greenwich Park); where expensive stadiums will be handed over to private football clubs that have lost all local connections (the main Olympic stadium); where fantastic stadiums are built that no-one can see a need for afterwards (the Velodrome); all of this points at a monstrous white elephant conceived by the decision making layers decide who will attend, and funded by us who have no chance of attending. Someone here, maybe yourself, commented on the empty seats - that is the corporate seats that are empty, they are not interested in the heats and the early rounds, saving themselves for the finals.

Our politicians keep on harping on about the sporting legacy that the games will create, that is just b#llsh*t. At the same time as they spout this, they are cutting £280 million of funding from sport in my county alone. The hypocrisy and double-speak is staggering.

As for the financial gain - get real, we all know there will not be one. Even Sydney did not benefit financially.

[Post=79532 Argus]

And they don't become less about "vanities of the IOC, politicians, and big business" if that's the only thing people keep talking about.

I'll leave this thread to those that want to discuss whether sport should be banned, or just the Olympic Games; that want discuss decisions taken months and years ago about location, clothes etc. etc. It's true that the Olympic Games have changed a lot, and professional athletes in the games have changed the whole thing. In 1912 our participant, to pick just one example, in the marathon had no athletic background at all three years before the game; ran in new shoes, and got sore feet, still ended in sixth place... In the same marathon a Japanese fellow disappeared; he got exhausted, it was quite hot that summer, quit the race, and a couple in a house nearby offered some lemonade and lent him a costume. It took quite some time for him to finish the marathon, 54 years.

[Post=79533 viking33]

The revelation about the empty seats that Bob Phillips touched on was revealed tonight on the air.
Seems they are Olympic officials seats, for them and "friends." It was stated that, if there are empty seats available from now on, they will be given to soldiers and families. We will see.

[Post=79624 GeoffW]

Congratulations to the gal from Lexington on her early victories. We'll all try to root her home

One must be careful about using this expression in Australia. It means something entirely different. You wouldn't be still married if you did this in Australia.

[Post=79626 BobH]

In the Carolinas, there is an old but still popular dancing style that raises the eyebrows of every Brit I ever asked if they like to do it.

[Post=79907 Bigaldoc]

On a non-athlete note, here's a story about a few kids from my town who are interns at the games.

3 Lexington high school grads share experience as interns at Olympics | Olympics

[Post=79912 Bigaldoc]

I have to be honest and say that in my opinion Great Britain blew one today by giving that last shoot out kick to this guy!

Chelsea striker Daniel Sturridge missed the vital last kick with what looked like a dumb "stutter step" that the Korean keeper picked up on right away.

Oh well, on to the events of tomorrow...