Olympics

Just a question......that's always confised me coming from the opening ceremony.....why if we call our country Australia when we're introduced as something like L'Australie in french and something different in chinese?.. Follows the same in places like Italy....we all say Florence but the Italian name is Firenze (or something similar)...surely we should call each place by the name that the locals/natives use.....Begique or Belgium?.....and why are we shown endless swimming and never see but a touch of the different sports tripple jump/polevault/Judo/wrestling/taekwondo.........rant & questions over

On your first point, I concur.

I never understood it either. I just assume it's the arrogance of each culture having to assign their OWN name to things (which is pretty disrespectful in my mind).

As for swimming, it's where Australia wins the most, so of course they'll put focus on stuff we don't suck at.

It's called propaganda.

DroothR wrote:
I never understood it either. I just assume it's the arrogance of each culture having to assign their OWN name to things (which is pretty disrespectful in my mind).

Maybe it has something to do with countries wanting to make it easier for people to remember or pronounce their country/city names - Bankgkok's full name is 'Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Yuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit' no way I'd be able to remember that.

Then again, maybe it has something to do with cultures wanting to preserve their cultural identities - see the name changes in India - or maybe it has something to do with how certain phrases or letter combinations are treated in certain countries, i.e. maybe pronounced differently or have no equivalent.

As for why Australian TV doesn't cover other sports like judo etc. It has do with the size of our telecast crew (very small when compared with the heavy hitters like NBC), our chances of getting medals and the ratings.

Anyone know if SBS is covering judo, TKD and wrestling?

Yeah, SBS will be showing the "smaller" sports. They've already given handball a showing today

Liked the opening ceremony. Highlight for me was the girl in the red dress, singing that wonderful Chinese song "I love the one child policy".

simmo wrote:Liked the opening ceremony. Highlight for me was the girl in the red dress, singing that wonderful Chinese song "I love the one child policy".

I thought she was covering a Tom Jones song.

My personal favorite was their touching display regarding the Green House Effect and Looking after the Enviroment. oh, wait...no, the best part was the Dove of Peace.

Some of the strangest basketball umpiring in the US/Spain match yesterday.....blatant pushes ignored/called wrong way, the always random travel & 3 second rules. Opals looking good tho

The Dr Of Style wrote:Some of the strangest basketball umpiring in the US/Spain match yesterday.....blatant pushes ignored/called wrong way, the always random travel & 3 second rules. Opals looking good tho

The reffing in men's international basketball is definitely random at best. I noticed that the European refs tend to turn a blind eye to the obvious push and shove stuff, but blow the whistle at the soccer-style flops (I'm talking about you Manu). I remember a ref calling "offensive goal tending" after an alley-oop dunk a couple comps back.

The best part of the opening ceremony was the smiley fire works.
Though more than half the fireworks displayed weren't actually set off.
The girl in the red dress was lip syncing

TheSweetestThing wrote:The best part of the opening ceremony was the smiley fire works.
Though more than half the fireworks displayed weren't actually set off.
The girl in the red dress was lip syncing

So the song she was singing was "Blame it on the Rain"!!

If Aus lose this basketball game now after being so far in front...grr. Why on earth is goorjian sitting Bogut for so long? Ram home the advantage while he's killing them!!!

Anyone ragging that womens sport is terrible I'll direct them to the final of the volleyball...... what a great game....had to keep flicking between that & the opals

My mum taped the closing ceremony and was playing it this morning. When I heard "whole lotta love" being played I went "what!?" and ran into the lounge room. Damn that was awesome!