Olympic rant V.1.1

The final countdown has started; only 5 days left and I'm all anticipation. Athletics and swimming and gymnastics, oh my! A girl must make a schedule to watch everything. Of course, I have to make myself watch the opening ceremony first.

Every four years I lock myself in my house, open the TV and watch whatever sport is on. It doesn't matter if there are Greek athletes competing, whether I like it or even understand it, it's the Olympic Games, it's only every four years and you know the athletes will give their best performance. I've even stayed up at 3am to watch dressage! Mind you, I thought that was the first day of the qualifying rounds of the athletics, but still I watched it and found it interesting before it was over.

Sadly I can't say the same about opening and closing ceremonies. A total waste of time and money in my opinion. I can't understand why a large percentage of the budget is spend on laser shows, folklore choreographies and fireworks when it could be invested on stadiums. Frankly, the parade of the countries and the final part of the torch relay are my favorite parts, not by comparison to the boring stuff, but because they are really the reason why I tolerate 3 or more hours of "celebration". What's more touching than watching countries you've never heard of being represented by their athletes or seeing a legend of the sports lighting the temple inside the stadium?

Well, Athens 2004 has set out to destroy these moments as well. It seems that our national colors aren't fashionable enough, therefore our athletes will parade in khaki suits! That's the latest rumor circulated by a Greek TV station. Please say it isn't so.

As far as the final torch bearer is concerned, Kenteris seems to be the favorite, for now, though I could think of many worth of that honor. My pick would be Domnitsa Lanitou-Kavounidou, the first Greek woman who participated in Olympic Games, in 1936. In a time when women's competition wasn't taken seriously, was discouraged to say the least she had the courage to follow her dream. Luckily others believed in her and allowed her in the Olympic team. She didn't win any medals, but her try was just as valuable as Mr Kenteris' medals, not to disrespect the latter. But HOC and Athens 2004 seem to favor athletes with relatively recent achievements and Ms Lanitou-Kavounidou's chances are small to none.

I know that no matter what I say now when the time comes I will be sitting in font of my TV watching the ceremony. I've seen Barcelona, Atlanta and Sidney, why not Athens?