Olympics - day 6 and 7

Yesterday evening was spent in the same way as the Chinese President Hu Jintao - watching China play America in volleyball. The team events against teams like Japan and America have proven main attractions. However, USA didn't read the script and won. Not to worry, though, because if you changed channels you'd see yet another Gold in the weightlifting. Speaking of which, in the heaviest women's weightlifting event earlier in the day, what can only be described as a large piece of muscle with a head won another Gold for China.

Fun and games in the badminton. China won the men's doubles - or at least, it looked like the Men's doubles. Turned out to be the Women's doubles. More than a few of the Chinese athletes, weightlifters excluded, look like small boys, it can be confusing. Anyway, the match certainly captured the imagination of the crowd, with plenty of booing for the opposing Koreans. (There's quite a lot of booing going on, especially when China plays Japan or America). And the Chinese No. 1 Mens player seems a bit of a character, striping of his shirt after his semi final and fist-punching all over the place.

Every evening, there is a talk show with the Olympians of the day. Last night was the turn of the women's group fencing team. Unfortunately, they only won silver, which is not going to make you stand out when your fellow countrymen are winning Golds for breakfast. The interview was slightly awkward, being only silver medallists, but the gentle background piano music continued, with a slight riff when someone said something approaching humorous. The audience were all wearing the same clothes, and had all been given two plastic things looking like fingers that are used as a replacement for clapping, clapping being such an onerous activity.

The evening news features the Olympics pretty much entirely, and the News Channel has been turned over to the Olympic coverage for 98% of the time. Yesterday there were a lot of features about the foreigners in Beijing, how much they're enjoying it, showing pictures of attractive blondes renting a bike from a helpful volunteer, etc. Every night on the 7 o'clock evening news, there's a montage of Chinese athletes on the Gold platform, with shots of the flag rising, played against a full rendition of the anthem. Another interesting thing is that they often talk about what foreign media say about the Olympics, with high praise all round. Not least from the President of Armenia, special guest on CCTV9. They also have lots of different features about a whole host of different things, including one of Phelps trying and failing to speak Chinese. His swimming has captued the imagination here, but his tones need some work.

Generally, I think the coverage is excellent, certainly near-blanket. Unsurprising, really. There's obviously cynical reasons for it - ramp up the patriotism, which every country likes, especially prominent in China. But also, the Olympics are in China, and they've waited a long time for this oportunity the outside what China is all about. In addition, they have a huge number of competitors in every sport, so it makes sense to have a lot of coverage. No coverage of Tibetan protests, rather obviously.

China-bashing continues at length in the Guardian.
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/sport/2008/08/16/cctv_quickly_wears_out_its_wel.html
The absurdity of someone who doesn't understand a single word of Chinese talking about what she sees on Chinese TV is apparently lost of this journalist. Yes, it's a mass patriotism fest, but its the same everywhere. The adverts obviously have a presence, but I've hardly noticed them, and at worst you can change channel to one of the many others also showing events. They often talk about the Chinese athletes themselves, running segments showing them training, interviewing them, etc. It's also not true to say they don't show Chinese athletes failing - the crying Du Li, who came 5th in a shooting event, has been featured as prominently as anything else, they interview atheletes who don't meet up to expectations, they've showed a Chinese cyclist crashing into a ditch, and when Japan beat China in women's football yesterday, the commentators were as magmanimous as can be expected. There's also a fair amount of coverage events where the Chinese aren't dominant, especially swimming.

The song for this Olympics is cringy and horrible, but thats more a matter of taste of than anything. Here it is -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1z40f57vzk

All these guys are really famous in the Chinese - speaking world - Singapore, Taiwan, HK and the Mainland, although probably only Jackie Chan is know to Europeans. According to another feature, it's also the most popular choice at karaoke for the the past week. Well, why not.