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Post by philknj on Dec 22, 2021 12:38:09 GMT
The Opening Ceremony will be Friday, February 4 and the Closing Ceremony will be on Sunday, February 20 ... the countdown to invading Taiwan starts after that.
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It seems there was a big online article dated December 14 on Chloe Kim being all grown up in a recent edition of the NY Slimes (pic below) ... I'll have to look for print copy. I'm curious to know about her indoctrination education at Princeton. This article has a few details on what she said:
I thought she was retired from this frivolity, but she was only away for 22 months. She won a tournament in Colorado this past Sunday ... nailed her third run after falling during her first two ... I hope she's not going to get all super drama queeny like Simone Biles as the pressure builds in China.
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Post by philknj on Dec 22, 2021 13:53:25 GMT
This just in, NHL pulling out of the Games:
The plan is to send amateurs and minor leagues scrubs to China, which was done in Korea four years ago.
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Post by jumpcut on Dec 22, 2021 20:15:56 GMT
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Post by fanofseri on Dec 23, 2021 7:18:38 GMT
I lived in a big garden apartment complex where some people kept parrots parakeets, pigeons & doves in tiny cages. I used to sneak onto their patios and let them go. I imagine the nearby hawks and owls got to them within a few minutes.
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Post by philknj on Jan 18, 2022 19:03:41 GMT
The most miserable Olympic Games since, well, the last Olympic Games 5-6 months ago, will commence in only 15 days with the first curling competition. A few news items:
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As expected, no foreign fans will attend, but now they are blocking domestic fans as well.
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The most recent U.S. women's skating champ had her career-best ISU scores two years ago ... and will turn 26 in April ... Katarina Witt, call your office.
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Unlike four years ago, North Korea will not be holding hands with South Koreans, or anyone else.
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Post by jumpcut on Jan 20, 2022 17:47:51 GMT
NBC presents the Beijing Olympics...live from Stamford, Connecticut! COVID concerns will keep NBC announcers home from the Beijing Olympics
With the 2022 Winter Olympics taking place in Beijing in less than two weeks, NBC Sports announced Wednesday that it will not be sending any announcing teams to this year's Games — citing "COVID concerns."
"The announce teams for these Olympics, including figure skating, will be calling events from our Stamford (Connecticut) facility due to COVID concerns," an NBC Sports spokesperson said in an email to NPR.
www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2022/01/19/1074256301/nbc-not-sending-sports-announcers-to-winter-olympics
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Post by IceCat on Jan 26, 2022 2:02:06 GMT
All who will be trapped inside the Olympic bubble will be obliged to download the official Beijing 2022 app. Officially its so that the health authorities can keep track of their COVID-19 status, but because this is China we're talking about there is a privacy issue that's been detected in the app. For this and other reasons many delegations, including the US and Canadian teams, are urged to leave their personal devices at home and use only burner phones in Beijing. Oh, and they're discouraged from calling home even with a burner phone since it could potentially expose the person on the other end of the line to data exploitation from the CCP. Supposedly those within the bubble can access YouTube, Google and most social media, but any reference whatsoever to forbidden subjects such as Xinjiang, the Tiananmen massacre, Taiwan, Hong Kong or human rights in general could expose one to unwanted attention from the authorities. The COVID-19 testing being employed in the bubble is said to be more sensitive than what we're used to in the West, which means that even if you've recovered from the virus months ago you could still test positive, and a positive test means your Olympic experience ends right then and there. As referenced previously tickets won't be available to the general public but instead distributed by organizations allied with the CCP, ostensibly to ensure a virus-free environment but given the source it's definitely going to enhance the home field advantage for Team China with only party faithful in attendance. Most ordinary Chinese will be home with their families anyway as Lunar New Year falls on the first of February, 3 days before the Opening Ceremony, so the authorities will have their hands full trying to squelch out any potential outbreaks during the single biggest annual migration on Earth, a mass movement of people that puts the period around Thanksgiving to shame.
Some of the venues utilized for the 2008 Summer Olympics will be reused for these Games. The National Stadium, aka the Bird's Nest, will host the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, while the National Aquatics Center will have an ice covered deck placed over the pools to enable it to host...curling. The National Indoor Stadium and the Wukesong Indoor Stadium, used for gymnastics and basketball respectively in 2008, will host the watered down hockey competitions. The oldest venue of all, the 1971 vintage Capital Indoor Stadium, which hosted volleyball in '08, will be used for figure skating and short track. The only new construction within Beijing proper, aside from a new Olympic Village since the 2008 version has long since become apartments, are the National Speed Skating Oval and Big Air Shougang, where ski and snowboard big air will be contested. The other snow and sliding sports are in new venues far from the capital. Supposedly all of the venues will be carbon neutral, a bold claim from a nation whose economy is still wedded to carbon, especially coal, so one wonders how clean the skies over the capital will be, particularly since pollution is usually WORSE in winter than summer.
The most realistic gold medal hopefuls for Daehan Mingguk (the Republic of Korea) are as usual in short track. The Garlic Girls could win another medal, while others may come in freestyle skiing and speed skating, but coming close to the record haul of 17 medals as host nation 4 years ago is highly unlikely.
Kevin
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Post by HappyFan on Feb 8, 2022 7:10:08 GMT
Eileen Gu is an 18-year-old part time model and future Stanford student who was born in San Francisco. Today she won a gold medal in another of those weird jump-and-twist on skis in the air sports. She represented... China. (her mom is Chinese). linkShe's receiving a lot of crap from the usual mouth breathers, but she is handling it like a boss: "If people don't like me that's their loss, they'll never win the Olympics." BURN! https://www.instagram.com/p/CY_uTTNF-QD I have always found it weird when athletes represent other countries than their own. Let's not forget that the US has taken advantage of that many times in the past in recruiting athletes to represent us. But at least Gu (Chinese name Ailing Gu) has Chinese parentage, speaks fluent Mandarin, and has been to China many times in her life.
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Post by philknj on Feb 8, 2022 21:24:06 GMT
I don't have a big problem with Gu competing for China ... "temporary citizens of convenience" have competed in the Olympics for decades (like that goof Rory Sabbatini for Slovenia).
However, I'm a bit taken aback by this figure skater Zhu Yi (ex-Beverly Zhu) ... whose idea was it to give up your U.S. citizenship for China? Are you nuts?! It seems China has been buying recruiting numerous foreign-born athletes to gin up its medal count. In the case of Zhu, they might have picked up a washout who wasn't good enough to make it on Team USA ... she fell on her azz in two team performances so far.
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Per the article above, China's trolls had a field day ... samples:
On Weibo, China's Twitter-like platform, the hashtag "Zhu Yi has fallen" gained 200 million views in just a few hours. Many questioned why Zhu, an American-born skater, was picked to represent China at the expense of an athlete born in the country.
"This is such a disgrace," said a comment with 11,000 up votes.
But she has faced criticism in China for not being able to speak fluent Chinese.
"Please let her learn Chinese first, before she talks about patriotism," a Weibo user said on Sunday.
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For whatever reason, China has only one skater in women's singles and Zhu is it. How would you like to skate in women's singles next week with a billion people on your back? If you screw up again, you don't have a teammate to bail you out.
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Post by philknj on Feb 9, 2022 1:28:33 GMT
The link above is covering the games ... I don't know if any other ROK channels are covering them. I don't know if it shows anything LIVE ... it currently has a repeat of the men's 1,500 meter speed skating final, which happened today (China time, they are 13 hours ahead of NYC). I'm looking at the final results on Wikipedia ... these two broadcasters are going crazy over skaters who were way out of the running. They will bust a gut when the two Koreans skate later.
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Post by IceCat on Feb 9, 2022 5:43:52 GMT
I watched the final round robin match in mixed doubles curling between Canada and Italy. It was tied 7-7 after regulation, requiring an extra end. Canada had last rock in that end and all they had to do was slide it onto the button. Unfortunately it went to the back of the button right next to a similarly placed Italian stone, so out came the measuring device to determine which was shot rock. After swinging it around twice it was determined by MILIMETERS that Italy was closest and thus the winner, eliminating Canada from medal contention. In my limited exposure to the sport I've never seen the margin of victory be so close, narrower than the width of one's pinky finger. Italy would finish the tournament undefeated with the gold medal. John Shuster and his crew will begin their defense Wednesday night local time against the Russians while the Garlic Girls open against Canada on Thursday evening in Beijing.
Kevin
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Post by HappyFan on Feb 9, 2022 7:39:15 GMT
Chloe Kim in action! She had her qualifying runs today. She posted a massive score without even working up a sweat and will go into the finals tomorrow as top qualifier. linkGood luck Chloe! Have a churro and get lots of sleep! https://www.instagram.com/p/CYWizqLItl8 (I don't really understand this sport, but it's ridiculous how much more air she gets than the other ladies. They seem to all top out at 8 feet, while she was easily making 12 at times). Meanwhile, Michaela Shiffrin is having the Olympics from hell. Yesterday, she wiped out in the Giant Slalom five gates into it. Today she barely made it three gates into the slalom before she went off course. After that, she sat on the side of the course for what seemed like forever while the other skiers continued. linkThen they insisted on interviewing her, which was really cruel. She was totally devestated. Why they did that is beyond me, especially because she still has events to prepare for, at least one of which she could still win. Buncha idiots... Oh, and I was flipping around and had a Tom Abbott sighting! He was covering Biathlon of all things!
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Post by HappyFan on Feb 9, 2022 16:54:29 GMT
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Post by HappyFan on Feb 9, 2022 17:10:43 GMT
The Chinese women's hockey team also has its share of ringers. This is Zhou Jiaying, one of China's goalies. A woman of Chinese heritage, she was born Kimberly Newell in Vancouver, BC, and played college hockey at Princeton. She was given the new Chinese name when she joined the team LOL (all Western players are given Chinese names apparently). Anyways, she helped design the cool dragon pads for her goalie outfit. https://www.instagram.com/p/CZiXwzFJf3y She also wears this mask: I highly expect China won't come anywhere near to a medal, but at least she'll go down to defeat in style. https://www.instagram.com/p/CZqOulnlWIV
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Post by philknj on Feb 10, 2022 3:45:28 GMT
SBS Sports showed Korea winning its first gold medal today -
BEIJING, CHINA - FEBRUARY 09: Daeheon Hwang of Team South Korea celebrates winning the Gold medal during the Men's 1500m Final A on day five of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games at Capital Indoor Stadium on February 09, 2022 in Beijing, China. (Photo by Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)
FYI - The two Hungarian skaters in the final had the last name of 'Liu'. ... funny, they didn't look Hungarian to me.
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A bizarre side note ... the 2018 winner was Hyo Jun Lim of Korea, but he didn't defend his title. But, he is still skating these days ... for CHINA. This verbatim excerpt from his Wikipedia page explains why:
In 2020, Lim was convicted of sexual harassment after pulling down another male athlete's pants in front of teammates in 2019. Following the conviction, Lim was banned from competing for the South Korean national team. He was later found not guilty by the appeal court. In March 2021, at the invitation of the Chinese Skating Association, Lim applied for Chinese citizenship and will represent China at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.[28]
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