Olympics
 

I am starting this in entertainment, I am not sure where it should go. Is anyone else as excited as I am for the games? Any favorites? Anyone you know going to compete? Anyone actually going?

Heck yeah, I'm excited! I will be glued to the television set the entire time.

My cousin will be playing for Greece's softball team! Softball is not a sport in Greece, but as the host country they receive an automatic bid into the tourney. So Greece put out a call for women of Greek descent to try out for the team--my cousin landed one of the spots. We are SO proud of her!!! :D

Three cheers for Bryan Clay, American medal contender in the decathlon, has come a long way since our summer fun days at Kapaolono Park.

I'd love to go to Athens, but I'll be content with my TV at home or at the bar.

I'm all for watching the opening and closing ceremonies... always prescribed to the same formula laid down by Baron Pierre de Coubertin over 100 years ago.

Politicians are tempted to grandstand the opening ceremony... but Olympic rules require them to only declare the games open.

Here's the rules for the opening ceremonies, straight from the IOC's website: http://multimedia.olympic.org/pdf/en_report_840.pdf

I'm sooo excited. I love the opening and closing ceremonies.

I pay special attention to the gymnastics and swimming.

Me too; I also love the diving.

i tend to be more of a winter olympic gal myself (what can i say? i dig men in tights on ice), but i do watch the gymnastics and diving comps. i remember the olympics being a HUGE deal when i was little, but i don't feel the hype now. who's gonna be the last person carrying the torch i wonder?

The run-up has been building for a while, and this weekend was the send off at the cottage for people going...

My second cousin is there for wind-surfing
Some guys from the lake are there for sailing
and
A chapter alumn is there for the CBC :)

I recently read an article either in the ESPN magazine or the Sports Illustrated. It basically stated that they were against this b/c the people trying out for the Greek baseball/softball teams have some Greek ancestry but it's pretty far removed & that Greece is only doing this to try to win a medal in a sport they do not play. Also, these "temporary" Greeks do not know the language or the culture or even the national anthem for the country they are competing for. The most of Greek culture that they know is based on movies like "Zorba the Greek" & "My Big Fat Greek Wedding."
It was an interesting article to say the least. I didn't know that you could do this kind of thing.

However, good-luck to your cousin. The Olympics is a once in a lifetime opportunity so may she enjoy & make the most of it.

Re: Olympics
 

I always watch the olympics. My favorite events to watch are: Track & Field(men and women), Swimming(men and women), Diving(men and women), Women's Gymnastics, Women's Soccer, and all the equestrian stuff(because I'm from Kentucky the land of Beautiful horses and the Rolex Three Day event which is an olympic qualifier here in Lexington).

I think there was another Olympic thread a month or so again, but nobody answered my question: Does anyone know of any GLO's being represented this year?

aj

I watched bits of a really interesting TV program last night about the games. Hitler was actually the one who started the tradition of the torch relay. There was also something about the rings - the Germans planted some in Greek soil and had their archeologists "discover" them as a link to the original Olympics (don't know if the rings were in use before the Munich games or if it was another Hitler invention) and he also was the first to make such a production of the opening ceremonies. I was surprised that some of the traditions we now love were started by Hitler and that no one has put up a stink about it...

Sorry, AJ, don't know any GLO ties to the games.

And I'm excited that Mo Bhardwaj gets to go. I didn't realize they had set the team yet.

I think someone mentioned members of Iota Phi Theta and Omega Psi Phi are competing. Not sure of other organizations.

I love watching gymnastics, rowing, and football. Yay!

In days of old, the Olympic salute to the head of state during the opening ceremonies was very similar to the Deutscher Grüss ("German greeting", aka the Nazi salute), that ended after the 1936 Olympics.

The torch relay was introduced in the 1936 Berlin games.

The modern Olympic ring design and flag was designed by Baron Pierre de Coubertin. Originally, the flag had the motto of the Olympics - Citius Altius Fortius - (Faster, Higher, Stronger) below the rings but that was dropped from the flag in the 1920s.

After the Nazi-engineered spectacle of the 1936 Olympics stricter controls were placed on the opening ceremony after World War II.

(On a semi-related topic, Hitler drove the first Volkswagen Beetle off the assembly line (originally known as the KdF-Wagen (Kraft durch Freude "Strength through Joy" - the Nazi-controlled travel and entertainment industry for workers), but the Bug (and Volkswagen) endures today.)

I'm not a big summer olympic fan.
I usually stick to watching the aquatic sports.

I love the opening and closing ceremonies.

The Olympic Theme
 

The familiar trumpet fanfare that is so associated with the Olympics (though it is NOT the official Olympic anthem) was first introduced by ABC Sports for the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble, France. The title of the piece: "Bugler's Dream" by Leo Arnaud.

In 1984, John Williams created a theme for the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles called the "Olympic Fanfare and Theme" that is now considered a powerful piece of music associated with the Olympics and almost always played complementary to Arnaud's "Bugler's Dream".

When NBC took over the US television broadcasting rights to the summer Olympics in 1988, they commisioned John Williams to compose a unique theme for their Olympic Coverage, he composed "The Olympic Spirit" for them.

In 1996, Williams composed a theme for the opening ceremony of the Atlanta games called "Summon the Heroes", followed in 2002 with "American Journey" for the 2002 Winter Olympics.

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B0...1.LZZZZZZZ.jpg
1988 Summer Olympics album

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B0...1.LZZZZZZZ.jpg
Summon The Heroes (1996 Olympics)

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B0...1.LZZZZZZZ.jpg
American Journey (2002 Winter Olympics)

All of 'em are available at Amazon.com .

I'm usually more into the winter olypmics, but everyone in my family watches rowing. My brother is heavily into rowing (we have our fingers crossed that he will make the 2008 team - he was too young this time round, but had a good Olympic trial). He was telling us that this year's Canadian team is insane and that they look like absolute menaces in their unis.

Rowing is an awsome sport.

Good luck to your brother for 2008!

I love everything about the Olympics and will be glued to the TV. Thank heavens for Digital HD channels, I'll be able to literally overdose on Olympic coverage :D

That is so me... I was happy to see that like all of NBC's channels are running coverage. There will be something on at all times.. I have asked my boss if we can have a TV in my office to see the coverage, I think she will be cool with it!!!!

Anyways, I hope that Alan Webb medals in the mile,

On another semi-related note, have you all seen those Lifeguard things with that dopey guy getting beat up by the athletes? Quite an odd advertisement, but it is funny...

I disagree. The tryout process for the Greek teams has been going on for over two years. My cousin had to go through a rigorous screening process to prove her Greek descent--even having to go so far as travelling to Greece to locate birth and baptismal certificates for her grandparents. We spent several afternoons at the Greek Consulate here in Los Angeles filling out paperwork. I am sure that the process was similar for everyone else. I don't believe that they would pick up completely arbitrary people just to win a medal.

And while I cannot speak for everyone on the Greek baseball and softball teams, I can assure you that my cousin is not a "temporary" Greek. She is one-half Greek, and speaks, reads and writes the language. She knows the customs and the culture very well, and I know that she is very proud to be representing Greece. Having it in Athens just makes it even more special. If there are "temporary" Greeks, as you put it, perhaps this experience will encourage them to learn more about the rich heritage they can call their own.

By Jim Caple
Page 2 columnist

A.J. Brack is a 26-year-old New Jersey soil engineer who spent four seasons pitching in the independent minor leagues -- a very, very long bus ride from the majors.


He once pitched for a team that played every game on the road. He once found out he had been released by walking into the clubhouse and seeing another player wearing his number. He once played for a team that arranged for him to spend the season living in a trailer park with someone nicknamed "Cat Woman," because she kept so many pets. (Annie Savoy, she wasn't.)

Brack was a Bluesman, a Pioneer, a Jackal, a Canary and a Road Warrior during his minor-league career. Now, he'll be a Greek. This Sunday he will board a plane for Athens to play in a pre-Olympic test tournament. And this summer the New Jersey resident will pitch for the Greek Olympic baseball team.

That's right. The Greek Olympic baseball team. The U.S. won't have a baseball team in Athens, but by God, the Greeks will. And they just might be good enough to win a medal.

The Greeks may not know hard cheese from feta but as host country for the Olympics, they get an automatic berth in every sport they choose. Taking advantage of a little-known codicil in the Olympic constitution, they are stocking their baseball roster with the American and Canadian children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Greek emigrants. Among those on the current roster are former big leaguers Eric Pappas and Clint Zavaras, plus World Series vet Clay Bellinger and top prospects Pete Sikaris and Aaron Miles (who is good enough that he may have to pass up the Olympics if he's in the majors with the Rockies).

The uniforms may read "Hellas" (the Greek word for Greece) but the labels ought to read "Made in America."

You can compete in the Olympics for a country other than your own as long as you can trace a recent ancestry (generally a grandparent but in some cases a great-grandparent) to it, which is easier said than done. Particularly when you're talking about a great-grandparent who emigrated to the U.S. more than a century ago from a town in Greece that no longer exists. Pascual Perez thought it was difficult getting his Visa in order each spring? Brack has spent the past year compiling documentation tracing his ancestry back to his great-grandfather and he still doesn't have all the documentation he needs.

"Every time you think you finally have everything you need, there are two more things they want," Brack says. "I was almost like, 'Do you want my great-grandfather's finger as proof?' The first couple times I wanted to strangle someone."

This baptismal certificate is completely inadequate. The village priest forgot to sign his middle name. You'll have to come back next week. And bring your great-grandfather's umbilical cord with you.

"I had to do a lot of research," Brack said. "Everywhere you go, they say, 'No, you need to go there instead.' 'Go there,' 'Go there,' 'Go there.' I went to Ellis Island a lot. I started looking through old yellow pages to find old addresses. It wasn't easy. They would change names like they were sneezing. When my mother's grandparents got here, their name was Venechianokus, then Venechianos, then Venech."

At least the Greek consulates generally know about the team now. "Our names are in a matrix," Brack says, "so when we call up they don't say, 'The Greek Olympic baseball team? Don't blow smoke up my ass.'"

The Greek tryouts were held last November, though manager Rob Derksen is still looking for players to add to the roster. The players will play with their regular organizations this season and those who aren't on a 25-man major-league roster in August will play a couple exhibition games in Toronto and Baltimore. Then they'll fly to Athens and try to win a medal for Greece. With the U.S. and Korea out, they just might.

If it seems a little strange that players who may never even have stepped foot in Greece will represent that country in the Olympics, well, you don't understand how important Greek-Americans take their heritage. "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" isn't that much of an exaggeration.

Over the past century or so, many thousands of Greeks emigrated from their home to seek their fortune in a foreign land where they couldn't even speak the language. One of those was John Angelos, who came to America with $5 in his pocket. He labored in the mills of western Pennsylvania, opened a Greek diner in Baltimore and saved enough money to send his son, Peter, to law school. And now Peter not only is one of the most powerful lawyers in the country and the owner of the Baltimore Orioles, he is the man who has almost single-handedly funded the Greek baseball venture.

Angelos says this team is his way of giving a little something back to the country of his ancestry and he is so proud of the Greek-American connection that he wants the team to wear the U.S. flag on their shoulder patches.

So while the U.S. officially won't have a baseball team in the Olympics, we will have one to cheer anyway. As Brack says, "I feel like I'll be representing the country I was born in, as well as Greece."


Please note the above article was found at espn.com.

CASIGKAP your malicious comments were not only insulting to those of ethnic Greek descent such as myself and greeklawgirl.
But you maligned the journalistic integrity of major sports magazines with your racist comments.

"Temporary Greek"and "knowledge of their culture only came from movies such as 'Zorba the Greek' and 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding'." are the your words. Why are you so xenophobic? Unless your ancestors are Native Americans, you are also the descendant of immigrants. The result of assimilation to America sometimes means that traditions and knowledge of the mother tongue are sometimes lost.

And not all athletes of Greek-American descent chose to tryout and earn a spot on the Greek Olympic team of their specialty. For example Tom Pappas is a member of U.S. Track & Field Team. The following weblink will educate you to his accomplishments.
http://www.usatf.org/athletes/bios/Pappas_Tom.asp

Regardless of the country being represented these athletes have trained and earned their positions. For me it's a win-win situation to be able to root for both American and Greece during the Olympic games.

In honor of my ancestors who founded the games, I'd like to return the thread to its true purpose. To provide some background of certain traditions as had been done by AlphaSigOU(sp?) as well as comment about America's teams and athletes, and observations during the Games themselves.

Well said! (And you got the handle spelled right. :) )

I would be in the same boat... if Venezuela ever hosts an Olympics (that's a snowball's chance in hell of that ever happening) I could qualify under the same rules as the Greeks have done, as my mother's Venezuelan and I qualify for an olympic team. (Not that it will ever happen, as I'm pushing 40 and beer-chugging is not (yet) an Olympic sport! :D )

The Olympic Anthem
 

APXAIO PNEYM' AQANATON - ANCIENT IMMORTAL SPIRIT (The Olympic Anthem)
Lyrics by Kostis Palamas, music by Spiros Samaras
(source: http://users.otenet.gr/~bm-celusy/olympic.html)

Immortal spirit of antiquity,
Father of the true, beautiful and good,
Descend, appear, shed over us thy light
Upon this ground and under this sky
Which has first witnessed thy unperishable fame.
Give life and animation to those noble games!
Throw wreaths of fadeless flowers to the victors
In the race and in strife!
Create in our breasts, hearts of steel!
Shine in a roseate hue and form a vast temple
To which all nations throng to adore thee,
Oh immortal spirit of antiquity.

(NOTE: Because not everyone may have Greek fonts installed (not just Symbol, which is commonly used in GC), I didn't post the original Greek text - the site above shows the Greek and English text as well as the phonetic pronunciation.)

True that, these people have trained their butts off, and they are amazing to watch... Icannot wait to see these athletes perform, regardless of their countries. One thing to keep in mind, is that these guys do not have multimillion dollar contratcs, well most of them do not, and this is their chance to shine. I, for one, will be cheering them on.

WHOA! Chill out! CASIGKAP never even said she agreed with the article! She didn't say anything racist! She was simply paraphrasing an article she read that discussed the topic. She said she wasn't even sure it was an ESPN article, so just because you found something relating to it on espn.com doesn't mean that was the only article ever written on the topic.

Clearly Greeklawgirl responded with a calm, interesting, and informative post. Too bad you couldn't respond without being so nasty and accusatory! :rolleyes:

At the time I wrote my response I was upset and I edited my response quite a few times before I settled with that one . I did a basic search and epspn article was the only thing that had come up using her references using movie titles.

xo_kathy I'd like to thank you for challenging my response to CASIGKAP.It caused me to go that extra step and go to my alma maters website. And from gaining access to their library research section I found it. The alleged article was actually an opinion piece written by a columnist at Sports Illustrated. I will post the offensive article and those that don't agree can email the author as I have. I will NEVER spend my money on Sports Illustrated ever again.

I private messaged CASIGKAP an apology and will apologize in the thread as well. She sounded like she agreed with the columnist. If that's the case that's her opinion. I'll agree to disagree. If not I'm sorry and I was wrong.

Sports Illustrated, June 7, 2004 v100 i23 p92
It's Greek to Me. (The Life of Reilly) Rick Reilly.
Full Text: COPYRIGHT 2004 Time, Inc.

Byline: Rick Reilly

Ever munched on a gyro? Sipped ouzo? Smashed a plate on the floor while dancing?

If so, you, too, might be able to compete in the Athens Olympics.

No, no, not for the U.S.

For Greece.

Thanks to a very stupid rule, all kinds of Americans will be donning the ol' blue and white of Greece in the Summer Games, and most of them have never set a sandal in the place.

Once upon a time, somebody at the IOC with moussaka for brains decided that the host country of an Olympics should field a team in every sport, even for a sport that the natives don't know from a Macy's purse sale.

If you brought a baseball mitt into most restaurants in Athens, they'd start trying to slice it up as overcooked leg of lamb. Until recently there were only two baseball diamonds in the entire nation, and both of those are on abandoned American military bases. Yet Greece has a team in the Olympics!

Of course, the Greeks don't particularly want to take the world's stage looking like nine drunk guys chasing a bee. Answer? Yank in some Yanks! The Greek government says that if you, your parents, your grandparents or even your great-grandparents were born in Greece, you can compete for the Greek Olympic team--even if all you know about the Odyssey is that it has 11 cup holders.

You may have watched only half of My Big Fat Greek Wedding. The only Greek you ever heard of may be Jimmy The. The closest you may have come to Greece is working the fry vat at White Castle. The IOC doesn't give a fig!

Find an old baptismal certificate, get dual citizenship and you, too, can walk into the Olympic Stadium last during the Opening Ceremonies as a proud, fake Greek.

Opa!

Eighteen of the 24 players on the Greek Olympic baseball team are Americans, which is 18 more Americans than will play for America in the Olympics because America didn't even qualify. Maybe if the IOC didn't fritter away a wild-card spot in the eight-team tournament on the host nation, the U.S. would've gotten in.

True, some Homeland Security officials are nervous about Americans showing the red, white and blue in Athens and becoming instant terrorist targets, but disguising them in another country's uniform seems a bit drastic, don't you think?

Plus, you can't imagine the research--some of it paid for by Baltimore Orioles owner Peter Angelos--that went into proving these American athletes have Greek blood. During one search, an athlete discovered a family secret: Her grandparents were not married when they started a family.

Oopsa!

Clay Bellinger, who won two World Series rings as a utilityman with the New York Yankees, is loaded with Greek connections. "Well, my wife went backpacking there once," he says. Bellinger will be in the Olympics because his mother's grandma was born in Greece ... or once ate feta cheese, one of the two.

Jared Theodorakos, a pitcher for Baylor, says glowingly, "It's a dream come true!" Wait a minute--the dude dreamed of playing for Greece? Whose poster was on his bedroom wall, Zorba's?

Chris Demetral, a former Triple A player who is an infielder on the Greek roster, says, "Actually, I'm still waiting for somebody to tell me they're kidding."

No kidding. Sixteen of the 18 women on the Greek softball team will be Americans, too. You talk about unorthodox.

It's not really Greece's fault. Nobody knows softball in that country. Linda Wells, the Greek Olympic coach who happens to also coach at Arizona State, has been to Greece eight times in the past year trying to teach the locals how to play. But the outfielders still stand and look up at fly balls sailing over their heads like it's the Fourth of July.

Stacey Farnworth, a former college player who will be on the Greek team along with her two cousins, says the Americans are trying to bridge the language gap. "We try to use as much Greek as we can on the field," she says. "Like, How are you? is Ti kaneis? and Hello is Yassas." O.K., what's Greek for, The ball just rolled by us and two runs scored while we were chatting?

More than a third of the players on the Greek women's soccer team are Americans. That must make the folks in Sparta swell with pride.

None of these teams has a meatball's chance of winning a gold medal, nor do they have a right to. This is just the IOC wanting to be richer than King Croesus. It wants the host nation to have a team in each sport purely for ticket sales. After all, how else are you going to get Nick and Nia to go see a game that is so boring it requires a seventh-inning stretch just to stay awake?

If all the IOC cares about are tickets, let's get Jennifer Aniston on the softball team. Her name is shortened from Anastassakis and her godfather was Telly Savalas. Who doesn't love ya, baby?

In the Greek tradition, I'd like to spit in the hair of everybody involved. And not to ward off evil spirits, either.

If you have a comment for Rick Reilly, send it to reilly@siletters.com.

I did not agree with the comments made by Rick Reilly & I very likely paraphrased his article wrong BUT I simply mentioned that I had read somewhere (I could not remember the magazine) about a controversy regarding the Greeks having a baseball/softball team b/c they are the host country.
If Mexico hosted an Olympics, I too would qualify seeing that my father still lives there & my mother was born there along with 4 of my eldest sisters. I have read Sports Illustrated many times & have found that I usually enjoyed reading the opinion pieces by Rick Reilly. This one struck me b/c I had not heard of this being done nor had I ever really considered it that big of a deal. We have NBA players with multi-million dollar contracts playing for teams of their home countries. I don't think it's that different than what the Greeks are trying to do now.

EDIT: This piece by Rick Reilly is the one I was referring to not the one in ESPN magazine.

As yet another Greek-American, I think it's pathetic that Greece is being criticized for taking advantage of this IOC rule. Why not?

Olympic athletes have been representing other countries for years. I can remember when I was a kid, hearing of some swimmers training @ Univ of Miami, who were going to represent some other country...and we're taking 30 some years ago!

For years, athletes have tried to "cheat" their way onto Olympic teams - they dont' care who they represent, just that they are AT THE OLYMPICS.

Remember the movie Muriel's Wedding? A South African swimmer wanted to marry ANY Australian, so he could compete in the Olympics. Same thing.

So, why pick on Greece? It's the athletes who are trying out for these teams that should be criticized. OR should they? If you've trained all your life for one shot, and you could legally have a chance to win, wouldn't you go for it too?

Since there is a movement to make Chess into an olympic sport, you never know.

Have you seen that they're trying to make Poker a sport on the Olympics?
Also, did ballroom dancing become an Olympic sport?

On a different note: I have the Sports Illustrated Olympic Issue with me & it is got to be one of the better ones. Yeah they do focus a lot on the American athletes but there's this really neat section that speculates and talks about who the favorites are to win the events. It's really neat. Plus, there's also talk as to who on earth is going to light the torch. That's always fun to watch & I'm getting excited for this Friday.
I'll be moved in & my cable hooked up so I can hole myself up in my room & watch.
Honestly, I'm one of those people that keep the TV on almost 24/7. The opening games are always fun & my poor boyfriend is going to have to stay & watch with me instead of going out.
I'm rooting for the US mens & womens gymnastics team & I'm really hoping that we have an American woman win the gold all-around medal. The first & last one we had was Mary Lou Retton so I think we're due. It's been 20 years!

Who is the favorite to win badminton, both men and women?

Gymnastics for me!
 

I will definitely be watching the gymnastics, both men and women. The only time the men have ever medaled was 1984 which was boycotted by the Soviet Union (COLD WAR was still going on!)

Mo (her nickname) from the women's team was selling raffle tickets to raise money for her gymnastics training. (I was one for sixteen years....BIG BUCK$$!!!) Pamela Anderson gave her a $20,000 donation towards her Olympic Dream. I was so excited to see her get a spot on the women's team.

They left FOUR Women's World Championship team members off the 2004 Olympic Team. This is an older and much more experienced team than we have ever sent.

As for Blaine Wilson from the men's team, STOP TALKING ABOUT HIM! I would rather hear about the Hamm twins or Jason Gatson who has had his right knee reconstructed TWICE(!!!!!) who are on the Men's Team. Both times Jason blew his knee out in comptetitions. It is unheard of to come back and compete at this level from that type of injury.

Okay....enough from me!

GO USA!

4 MORE DAYS!!!

FYI: i don't know if anyone mentioned it yet, but the different countries will march into the olympic stadium according to the greek alphabet order.

I wonder how you spell Canada in Greek? *ponders*

It is becoming an Olympic sport. I *think* last Olympics was it's exhibition year and this year is it's first official year.

Now, I'm a classically trained dancer (though not ballroom) and I understand the physicality of it. However, it is NOT a sport! It's completely artistic. I know people think that ice skating is all artistic, but there are actual steps/elements that have to be included and have certain point values. In ballroom dancing it's all up to the judges and nothing is required. I just don't see it as a sport...but I will be watching if it gets TV coverage! ;)

KANADA.

Now I don't speak Greek, so I have no idea how United States of America is spelled in Greek.

I LOVE MO!!!! (Mohini Bhardwaj) I too am happy to see actual women competing in gymnastics. I love you forever Olga Korburt but dang!! The elfen midget takeover was too much. I speak of this as a former competitive gymnast and coach. It was nice to see Kelly Garrison and Kathy Johnson awhile ago. Brandy Johnson was refreshing too. I'll be watching the gymnastics of course. I agree with you regarding China.