Thoughts on the olympics: week 1

1. A friend asked me what country I cheer for in the Olympics. Good question. I first find it difficult to cheer for the Japanese even though I am starting my 9th consecutive year in land of the rising sun. I find it equally hard to cheer for the loud & obnoxious Americans though I had my higher education there for 9 years and now work for an American company. Cheering for China and/or Canada is like cheering for Martians; neither country identifies me as one of their own anyway, despite my biological heritage and official political status. So I cheer for good play and united comradeship, i.e., I cheer for the Olympians!!! (My wife said sarcastically, “you might as well say nothing, ‘cause you basically said nothing.” My Gosh, Olympics even brings the family closer together!)
2. Kitajima is a conceited SOB; even Japanese knows that. But does he walk the walk after talking the talk. Back to back Gold in 100 and 200 breaststroke in consecutive Olympics. The guy is half a foot shorter than the hulking American and European competition, and he killed them all w/ immaculate and well-engineered mechanics. I will never be a fan, but boy, the guy is a winner.
3. What is up w/ the Spanish basketball team posing in a photo w/ their eyes pulled up to make slanted eyes? Is that supposed to be cute? I told my wife I have experienced countless racial ridicules 10 time worse, so I just shrugged it off as a tasteless and unsuccessful attempt at humor, but she was livid. Reading the reactions on-line, it seems overseas Chinese are much more vocal about their criticisms (like OCA) than folks in China. Is it because overseas Chinese are fed up w/ never-ending racial-motivated innuendos and side glances in foreign lands, or because the Communist Chinese government is thumping down any negativities during the games, no matter what it is? In either case, the Spanish only reminded us that we could be in the same global village, but we don't even know our neighbors.
4. The Japanese men’s volleyball team played the Chinese yesterday, and with the Chinese leading 2 set to 0, I commented “Look, 60 years later the Chinese are killing the Japanese … for a change,” cleverly referring to the Nanjing massacre during WW2. My wife didn’t find that particularly funny, so I had to pretend to cheer for the Japanese for a while to atone for my ill attempt at humor. (empty chants of “Go Olympians!”) By chance, I actually ran into the 2002 version of the Chinese men’s volleyball team in HK airport once, and I walked up to them to compare my 6'2'' frame to theirs, and I was COMPLETELY dwarfed. These guys were averaging 2.0 meters or more, young, muscular, athletic, huge hands and feet. I remember a comedian making fun of Chinese w/ a song when I was first in Canada that went something like, “I like Chinese, they only come up to your knees, but they're cute and they're cuddly and they're ready to please… ”. Now that America is knee-deep in debts from sub-prime loans and GW's idiotic wars and the Chinese economy is booming, look who is laughing now. How the world has changed in 20 years...