heywilma | (no subject)

Hai, can't talk, busy watching sports. And radio assginment. At the same time. But mostly sport.

Seriously though, I think the Olympics is one of the only times I will watch sports with any enthusiasm. During the Athens games there were a bunch of times I stayed up to watch something, and I am a sucker for all the patriotic warbling ads that we always get, even if they're for unpatriotic commercial gain. And with these games there's an added dimension of 'omg must watch', because y'know, I was born in the city. Most of my family still live there, and for all the times I knock it and its people, I love it, and I will get defensive about it. I still cheer on the Chinese athletes (as long as they're not competing against an Australian that I like, cough Grant Hackett cough >.>) and come the 110m hurdles day you can bet your ass I'll be glued to the TV to watch Liu Xiang.

That said though, guys, can we get someone else besides Zhang Yimou to direct shit? There were some stand-out moments during the opening ceremony, like the drummers and the dancers on the scroll and I kind of liked the parasols >.> But the rest was kind of all big-production and 'meh' for me, besides the costumes there weren't any really great representations of the culture as the commentators seemed to think there was.

Sarah Brightman's hair was amazingly crazy, though.

And you know how the athletes took over two hours to fill the stadium? Americans, not helping with your single-file.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It seriously looked like the Americans were all trying to get near the cameras to me.

LOL I tried so hard to watch the whole thing but I fell asleep midway through the Parade of Nations, so I didn't even get to see New Zealand! Thankfully Dad's gf recorded it at her house, so I'll watch it later, but...I like watching it and knowing that everyone else it watching at the same time.

Man, from what I hear, not a lot of people managed to stay awake for the whole thing, because it took so long. By my clock, the whole thing ended at 2:20something, and watching five and a half hours of TV at that hour is exhausting. Though the lighting of the cauldron was totally worth the wait.

And the Australians were camera whores too! But at least they whored in a clump and didn't hold up the procession for an unnecessarily long time.

Yeah, I woke up when the guy on TV was doing his wrap-up speech, and I was like "...Damn."

Ah, I didn't see them. It's just cos there SO MANY in the Australian & USA teams, they can't afford to be anything but quick and efficient.

i thought the opening ceremony wasn't as good as athens or sydney. some parts were brilliant - like the paper and the dancers, and the type writer thing...
and the national anthem was nice to listen to.

but the chinese nikki webster kid was annoying - except for the song she sang which was quite nice.

I think mostly the Chinese takes events like this way too seriously, so they put on a hell of a show but it's all been done before.

Also I don't think it was their intention to re-do the Nikki Webster schtick, since kids are pretty much a staple in ceremonies like these - "look at us! We're cute and fluffy so you could totally overlook the fact that we're communists and are spreading propaganda through your TV :D :D :D"

The kid from Sichuan who came out with Yao Ming at the end was so cute, though.

Olympics and the Australian Open are the only times I really watch sport. But I think I won't be watching much of it this time, because I have so many things I need to be doing!

I like the patriotic warbling ads, too. They amuse me.

I watched the opening ceremony, but had to go to sleep shortly into the athletes parade. We set the rest to record, and watched it the next morning (admittedly, we were going in and out of the room most of the time - I was cooking). But our recording stopped just before the cauldron was lit - just after the guy with the torch got lifted into the air. :(

Yeah, that ceremony was uber long. If I had work in the morning on Saturday I would've went to sleep too. But we had a good time making fun of the athletes' uniforms :D

The lighting of the cauldron was, imo, very good. Though the whole time Li Ning was up there I kept on thinking, "if he dropped that torch it would be kind of hilarious." But mostly hilarious in the not way >.>

I looked the cauldron-lighting up on youtube, because I really wanted to see it! But all the videos were taken down for copyright violation, which is fair enough. But I wanted to see it... Hm. I wonder if there's an official website that has it...

When the guy with the torch (I take it that's Li Ning) was just lifted up, I thought the torch had gone out! But they're too clever to let that happen.

Yahoo7, official Olympic broadcasting partner! The interwbes are so handy :D

Yay! Thanks, Jenni :) I was looking on the official Olympics and Torch Relay websites, and could only find photos.

It is pretty spectacular :)

Also, love the icon. Mulan is awesome, as is the emperor :)

I totally missed Sarah Brightman? WTF? When did this happen?!

Near the end of the showyness, when there's a globe that rises out of the ground and there are people walking on it? Two singers on top start warbling in a pitch so high it's pretty much incoherent? One of them is this short and fat Chinese guy (who admittedly, can sing really well), and the other is Sarah Brightman in all her glory.

HA! I'll have to re-watch that now.

Have you sene that ad with Finnish person talking about how Australians suck and people from Finland are really good looking? I kind of like that one even though it's not really very patriotic at all

Haha, it sounds familiar, so I might've seen it at one point. And it's nice to have that break the pattern every once in a while.