Fakery

It’s been revealed that there has been a certain amount of fakery in the (spectacular to watch) opening ceremony for the Beijing Olympics. No! Really?

Listening to the news reports suggests that nothing like this has ever happened before and that all previous Olympics have been completely above board, both as a spectacle and as a showroom for world sportsmanship.

So, what are the crimes that the Chinese have committed. Firstly, as the Chinese national flag was brought into the stadium, a very cute 9-year-old girl sang an anthem. It has now been revealed that she was in fact miming. And not only was she miming, but she was also miming to the voice of another little girl. And why was the the 7-year-old not singing in person? The Chinese reason is that they felt that although she had a great voice, she did not 'portray the image that they wished to portray', which I think is Beijing 2008-speak for 'we think that she's a minger'. Maybe someone from Amy Winehouse's management company could take a leaf out of the Chinese book.

Crime No.2. The firework footprints that 'walked' from Tiananmen Square to the birds nest stadium. It now transpires that, other than the one directly above the stadium, the rest were generated by computer graphics. I would ask how much less the cost of computer graphics were compared with the cost of real fireworks in a country where their population is relatively poor.

I would also ask why has this come as such a surprise to so many people? When the modern Olympics were founded in the 1890s, the ideal of the three major 'players', Baron Pierre de Coubertin, Evangelis Zappas and Dr William Penny Brookes was that all the countries of the world should become closer through sport in a hope that future conflicts would no longer arise.

Sadly, they were very misguided, and the Olympics, from 1908 onwards, in my opinion, has turned into an international political pissing contest, the participants being used purely as political pawns by their governments (1936 Berlin, 1980 Moscow and 1984 Los Angeles being just three examples).

However, it did give the Russians the opportunity to invade Georgia (for any natives of Tennessee that are reading this, it’s not THAT Georgia). Now I am aware that the situation there is complicated and I am also aware that the Georgians are far from blameless in all this, and I am aware that this has been on-going for some time. But I still think it rather cynical that the Russians chose to invade when most of the world's attention is focused on Beijing.

President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia made comparisons between this invasion and the annexation of the Sudetenland by the Nazis. However, he could have made more modern comparisons such as the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956 and of Czechoslovakia in 1968, but at that point Georgia was part of the Soviet Union....

On a lighter note, here at Villaramble things have been relatively peaceful. Julie and Hannah are away in the Isle of Wight for a week, which has left me with time to devote to my kids.

Unfortunately, as I said last time, because of the passport situation, there is no possibility of a trip abroad, so what we have done is dug out the National Trust and English heritage books and decided to have day trips to various locations nearby. But we have the fall back of when the weather is really bad (this is summer in the UK) then the kids have models to make.

Drew had received, for birthdays and Christmases, various model aircraft kits, and he has taken the opportunity to complete/make some of these. By the time Julie gets back, his room will probably look like a busy WW2 airfield!

But the girls didn't want to be left out, so last week we went out and bought them a couple of model car kits, which Maggie has been completing with guidance from her big brother.

Finally, following on from my last entry, I have now received some of the photos from the barbecue at Barry's. But, the pictures aren't from Barry, oh no, James, having flown back to New Zealand and recovered from his jet lag, took the time to email me the pictures. Admittedly, Barry too has been in contact.

"Dear Mr sarcastic, owing to problems with my steam driven pooter I am unable to e mail the photos. I will, however, download to disc and post to you. So stick that on your blog."

Still nothing received. I guess I'll just have to keep waiting.