Olympics Junkie

Thursday 7 August

Well, tomorrow is August 8, which means that tomorrow marks the beginning of the Summer Olympics in Beijing. 17 days of pure delight for me, usually. I LOVE the Olympics, Summer and Winter Games both, but I think Summer might win out in a competition for my favorite if I had to pick. I usually camp out in front of the television, happy as a clam, for as long as I can manage, as often as I can manage when the Games are going on.

What is it that I love about them? Almost everything…the incredible athleticism displayed by people from all over the world, the best of the best in their sport come together in one place for the sake of friendly competition (well, until drugs entered the picture). I love it when a country makes their first appearance at a Games, with a lone athlete representing them but with their whole country behind them, routing for them at every step, because he/she is their countryman, their representative. It’s priceless. I love the “human interest” stories the broadcasters tell of nobodies who have becomes somebodies, the athletes who have overcome incredible odds to be at the Games, or to be the best in their country at their sport. I love the suspense in watching round after round of runners/swimmers wondering if someone is going to beat the best time. I love that there’s one place where countries who are at odds for almost every reason shake hands after a match. I love the opening ceremonies and the excitement they bring, the parade of nations and the face shots you get on tv of the athletes who are honored to be representing their country amongst such company, the athletes who are happy and excited and nervous and enjoying the chance to take a break from training for a few hours.

1996 marked a particularly incredible Games. My friend Sylwinn and I (15 and 17 at the time?), took a Greyhound bus down to Atlanta, where her grandparents live (the bus ride was an experience in and of itself). Their church was hosting a group of folks from France who had come to do outreach during the Games using their church in downtown Atlanta as a home base. There were games and performances and food preparations planned by the church for the duration of the Games. They decked out their parking lot with stages and tents and had high expectations for the crowds their central location would bring by. Little did they know that the people traffic was unusually low for an Olympic Games location that year. In the end we heard that most Atlantans got the heck out of town because traffic horror stories were being told in the media – none of the horrors ended up being true. But this also meant that the church was pretty disappointed and didn’t get the foot traffic they were expecting. This was the first time I recall encountering Chick-Fil-A. They had a kiosk in the church’s parking lot. Little did I know one day I’d be craving it in Africa.

So, there are lots of great stories from this trip. One of which has nothing to do with the Olympics really, but was for sure a cross cultural experience, so it relates. This group from France of course brought a chef with them. So Sylwinn and my jobs were to help said chef in the kitchen, preparing the dinner meals he cooked for whatever people the team brought back to the church. Now, I know zero French (Sylwinn speaks some because her mom grew up in France), and said chef knows zero English, and it’s just the three of us in the kitchen. Nice kitchen for a church kitchen from what I can remember; big with lots of windows. We did lots of body language and demonstrations in order to communicate, the chef would call my name and then demonstrate what he wanted me to do, while explaining in French, and then I would repeat the demonstration from what I gathered from his teaching explaining it back to him in English. Then he would nod or shake his head in disbelief and in the case of the latter the process started over again until we understood each other. This was the first time I cut eggplant. Vertically sliced and paper thin to be exact. And I must have sliced 100 eggplants, or at least that’s what it seemed like. And I didn’t even like eggplant at the time (I have grown to like it since you’ll be happy to know). I have no recollection of what dish was to be the final product of this madness but I’m sure it was delicious. This French chef would also sing hymns in French while he cooked and I didn’t know the words but some of the tunes were the same as hymns I knew in English, so he would sing in French and I would sing the same song but in English and I don’t recall which language Sylwinn chose as she had the luxury of being in a position of being able to choose.

Anyways, Sylwinn and I spent the days in the church kitchen with the chef and then the evenings were ours back at her grandparents’ house camped out infront of the tv watching every sport imaginable. Her grandparents let me drive their extra car (my first time driving a VW and I’ve been a sucker ever since), as a 17 year old in a brand new city, which was the focus of the world for 2 ½ weeks. Sylwinn and I have marveled at their bravery ever since we were old enough to realize that was a big deal! Now that Sylwinn’s a mom twice over I would imagine her marvel at the situation has only heightened! We got to go to a Track and Field event, a Field Hockey game, and the crowning glory of the trip was the women’s soccer tickets that we splurged on, not knowing anything about the world of women’s soccer internationally. Lo and behold we found ourselves seated in a stadium for what turned out to be the game that the U.S. women’s team won the Gold medal in a game against China…it was amazing, absolutely incredible! One of those, “I’ll never forget this” moments you have in your life every once in a while.

Okay, so now that I’ve bored you to tears, if you’re still reading you understand that I am fond of the Olympics, and that they start tomorrow. You might also remember that I’m living alone in an African capital city. Where in the world am I gonna get my Olympics fix?! I did read today that DSTV the cable equivalent here in Uganda is in fact doing 24 hour coverage of the Beijing Games…which just makes me want to watch them even more…knowing the coverage is there makes not having ready access to it that much more frustrating! So, those of you who pray, please pray that in God’s loving kindness He might see it good for me to have the opportunity to watch some of the Olympics.