She Said...

Aug. 16, 2008

…nothing much about “Living in Vallarta”. The only thing that stands out in my mind is the radar traps coming out of the tunnel, in both directions. Watch out, and keep it down to 40 kph, folks!

I’m stuck on the Olympics this week. There is something definitely magical and beautiful that happens during the Olympics, especially among the residents of the host city. If you were around 100 years ago in St. Louis, Missouri, or during the last century in L.A., Mexico City, Montreal, or at the Winter Games in Salt Lake City, Squaw Valley, Lake Placid, or Calgary, you know what I’m talking about.

Differences -and wars- are supposed to be set aside for the duration of the Games, just as it was decreed thousands of years ago. (The decree during the original Olympiads applied to all cities in the realm, not just the host city.) In my particular case, it was nice to see the French and the English speaking to each other, everyone was happy, everyone was friends when my former home town, Montreal, hosted the Olympic Games in 1976 – just as they had been nine years earlier for Expo, our World’s Fair in 1967.

I was lucky. I got to see the incredible «perfect 10» performance of Romania’s then 14-year-old gymnast, Nadia Comenici. It made me very proud to be Romanian too. Unfortunately, the previous Olympiad had been marred by the first terrorist attack – against the Israeli team in Munich, in 1972. They had to whisk Mark Spitz and his 7 world record setting gold medals away, just because he was Jewish too. Little did we know what would happen three decades later... We have to hope and pray that these Olympic games will evolve as they should: in the spirit of sportsmanship and universal friendship. Four years ago, as I was watching the Games televised from Athens, I found it very symbolic that the Israeli judo champ should win his medal exactly on the 32^nd anniversary of the massacre of his country’s team in Munich. Now I hear that Phelps, the amazing American swimmer, will try to beat Spitz’ 7 gold medal record.

According to AFP, legendary Spitz won’t be on hand in Beijing because, he says, «no one bothered to invite him.» Is he miffed? Darn right, he is! «They voted me one of the top five Olympians in all time … I won seven events. If they had the 50m freestyle back then, which they do now, I probably would have won that too,» he added. Spitz said it would have been a great idea if he could be the one presenting the gold medals to Phelps, who has for years been candid about his ambition to eclipse the mark of seven golds. May the gods on Mount Olympus smile upon you, Michael!

This time around, with the Games being in Beijing, I find myself getting up at 6 a.m. just to watch the events «live». Bear in mind that I am anything but a morning person, so this is playing havoc with my internal clock. Am I addicted to the Olympic Games? Yes. And yes, of course, I will be stuck to my TV until they end. I don’t normally watch sports on TV, but this and the World Cup (of soccer) are different. I also very much appreciate the advantage of legal and «not-so-legal» satellite feeds than enable us to watch other countries’ viewpoints and reports on the Games. With all due respect to the many qualities of American TV stations, I much prefer the other countries’ coverage of the Games. They admit and realize that the Games are for all 204 participating nations, and just because an American athlete isn’t expected to win the gold in any particular event doesn’t mean that such event should not be covered…

Getting back to these 6 a.m. reports, I must admit that the opening ceremonies in the «Bird’s Nest» were unlike anything we’ve ever seen before, nothing short of awesome, incredible, stupendous; I think that even the announcers ran out of superlatives to describe them. The same thing must have happened in India when Abhinav Bindra became the first individual athlete to win the coveted gold medal for India (in the 10-meter air rifle) thus ending decades of Olympic misery for India, the world’s second most populous nation - and a perennial underachiever at the games.

With the internet being what it is today, it is also fascinating to watch replays and read statistics online – as they happen. However, I never cease to be amazed by the continuous stream of spam that I’ve been receiving lately. It is all directed to my spam box, but I still check it, just in case something important has somehow been categorized as spam just ‘cause I didn’t have the sender’s email address in my list.

So Dr. William Smith writes «It me williams please reply your mail», while others have «URGENT REPLY!» Mr. Geir Helmerson tells me «YOU HAVE WON 1,500,000.00 *CONGRATULATIONS*». Others start with «Dearest beloved, please urgent response needed.» Sounds like the beginning of a funeral service… I guess it makes sense, considering that they go on to tell me about the deceased relative who has left someone or other zillions of whatever currency. If even one of the hundreds of such emails I’ve been getting over the years were legit, I would be a multi-zillionaire by now… I also get a whole bunch of «pre-approved credit» card applications, from all sorts of banks …except Santander! Of course. I’ve only been applying for that one for some three years now… And then there’s the newer rash of «Become a CSI, Anna!» What is that all about? Who, other than my friends, knows that I’m addicted to all the CSI programs on TV? Maybe the Mayor of Puerto Vallarta installed one of his 48 surveillance cameras in my living room, aimed at our TV, so that he could report my viewing habits to those Spam generators… Who knows? At this point, I wouldn’t put anything past anyone. By the way, have you ever imagined a world with no hypothetical situations?

One of the Canadian Olympians is an incredible 58-year old (yes, you read right!) woman called Susan Nattrass who made sports history at the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal as the first and only woman entered in the trap shooting event. She’s been an Olympian for some 40 years! Anyway, she stated in a televised interview that her motto is «If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.» What a wise woman! I think I might just follow her motto too.

Have a fabulous week, enjoy the heavenly sound & light shows, and do take care of each other! Hasta luego! pvmom04@yahoo.com Please remember that you can always find this column here …even if you can’t find the Tribune on line.

posted by Anna Reisman @ 12:41 PM