Olympics

[ewx]

The opening ceremony was enormously impressive.

• Apparently the chimneys were inflatable and supported from the top.
• Some of the twitter commentariat didn’t seem to find the parade of athletes very interesting but we found it an excellent opportunity to try to remember capital cities and to look up the grades of the flags.
• The German team’s color-coding was stood out as rather bizarre.
• I was amused by the commentator’s dancing around his (presumably IOC-mandated) inability to accurately name one of the competing countries: “Chinese Tapei… formerly known as Formosa…”
• Of all the demographics which I might have expected to unpatriotically attack the show, Conservative MP had not been very high on the list.

I’ve been intermittently watching the sport since then.

• The rowing this morning was impressive stuff, especially the men’s double. The exhaustion and disappointment of the British team was palpable.
• The tennis makes good background watching - much of the table tennis on the other hand is blink-and-you-miss-it stuff. The badminton seems to be somewhere inbetween.
• The post-race interviews, especially with gold medalists, are priceless stuff. Ditto audience members when they spot a camera is pointing at them.
• The huge number of newly created Olympic TV channels are a welcome innovation.

Comments

[twigletzone.livejournal.com]

Yes, Germany did rather come as the gender team, didn't they? I wondered if it had something to do with Caster Semenya.

[naath.livejournal.com]

Many of the teams dressed their men and women differently; Germany did seem to be going a bit over-the-top with their BLUE and PINK which don't even feature on the German flag.