Olympic Torch
On Thursday Madalene and I went to see the Olympic torch come through town. The torch is stopping at cities around the world, and is relayed from important person to important person as it is run, by hand, through each city, burning brightly.
The torch ran down Delmar Ave., near our house. We casually wandered the block down to the street, and then stood around for a bit as motorcycles and police cars drove down the street, heralding the approaching torch. An assortment of Samsung sponsored vehicles, including an H2 Hummer, blared music as they trundled along as part of the procession. Finally, a lady holding the torch and flanked by BMW motorcycles ran past. We clapped, and on the procession went. Then we got some sandwiches.
If that sounds a little anti-climactic to you, then you’d be right. It was all quite casual, and there weren’t many people out. The cheering when the torch passed was moderate, and the parade around the torch was measly at best. The torch itself was pretty neat though, a well crafted wood and aluminum device, with a sleek look.
I rememeber when I was in Elementary school how the Olympics was the biggest event I could think of. Each classroom chose a sport to follow, and we made charts of the progress. We dressed up in costumes of our favorite countries (at the time, my favorite country was Australia) and acted out the opening ceremonies. We even tried out different olympic events like long jump and soccer. The Olympics, and the events proceeding it, were several weeks of Olympic fever at my school.
But this event was rather lackluster. It was neat to see the torch being run along, but I was surprised at how little excitement there was, and how unexcited I was. Oh well.
Saturday 19 Jun 2004 | Sam | Other
Sam, too bad the torch run was so ho-hum for you. When my friend Loretta Capra ran the torch through 2.5 city blocks in Fort Collins in advance of the 2002 SLC Olympics it was HUGE. There was an unfortunate 6-8 inches of fresh snow on the ground, but the city plows had come through and the turn out was 2-3 people deep on the suburban streets, much more on bigger streets with about 500 people in the Oval at CSU.
Appartently they actually take great care to insure that the real flame is kept lit the entire time, with back-up flame sources burning 24/7 during the months long event. (No, they don’t just flick a Bic that morning, it is lit from the real thing.)
Loretta’s run was in memory of her friend Gil G. who was a runner killed by a drunk driver in 1992. Loretta has spearheaded the Cinco-cinco 5K run for him every year since on Cinco de Mayo. Her run was emotional, 75-100 friends and family waited for her arrival (in the “torch van”) for her “pass”. I have to admit, it was inspirational and moving.
I suppose the moral of the story is: if there is an emotional link to the event, it is much more memoriable. Still, I’m glad you guys went to see it.
I saw the olympic flame too a few years back ( http://www.andrewsw.com/story.php?storyid=2002/1/6/12 ) and it was also anti-climactic for me as well.
I’ve been trieng to watch Hennie Kuiper carieng the fire in Amsterdam. He won gold in 1972… which was a real bad year to win.
As well Yvonne van Gennip. I’ve done a event together with her. She made 3 world records on ice-skating on the winter-Olympics in 1988.