Sunday, August 10, 2008

Some Notes on the Olympics

1) I miss Ian Thorpe. While Michael Phelps has captured America's attention and may in fact beat Mark Spitz's record of seven gold medals in a single Olympics, I care less than if the Australian Thorpedo was swimming again.

2) Why is all the music American? It may be just the events I've caught so far; I mean, I'm not sure about the relevance of beach culture in China or Japan or France, so I'm not sure if there is any music even remotely akin to the Beach Boys, but it just seemed strange that during the beach volleyball match all I heard was American tunes. Same thing with the gymnastics and swimming. It is just odd. I am hoping that it is just the music I know that my brain is picking up on, kind of like the phenomenon of noticing your car's color or type on the road more often than others, but I'm kind of thinking that American culture really is just that prevalent. I blame a friend of mine's blog entry for getting me to even think semi-deeply about the subject.

3) I can blame that same friend for getting me to notice the fact that two of the American saber fencing medalists were wearing flip flops when they were chatting with Bob Costas. I understand the gold medalist's choice in footwear. She was wearing a casual outfit and chose a casual shoe. Same thing with the silver medalist seated next to her wearing sneakers. But the incoming Duke freshman, Becca Ward, wore a very nice skirt and top and flip flops for shoes. That was an odd mish mash of serious and casual and was kind of odd.

4) Congratulations to 18 year old Taehwan Park from South Korea, whose Olympic dreams were dashed 4 years ago when he fell into the pool before the start of his race and thus disqualifying him. He managed to take gold in the Men's 400 metre free-style this time around.

5) Congratulations to 41 year old Dana Torres, who was one of the reasons America got silver in the relay race.

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