Attention to detail type people will have noticed that I have not yet spoken one word on the 2008 Beijing Olympics. There are reasons for this, and I shall now enunciate them. Truth be told I'm not much for sports of any kind. Sure I might play a pick-up game here and there when the mood strikes me, and I have been known to catch the Tennessee Volunteers play a game or two of football, but for the most part I haven't the slightest interest in watching athletic contests.
This most certainly rolls into the Olympics. Like millions of people, as a kid I waited desperately for the Olympics to roll around every four years, but over the last decade I've not given them much mind. I believe I caught some volleyball during the last summer contest, and I usually let the TV stay on during any game of curling but other than that I just don't care. Even in the midst of Beijing madness I can't say I have any particular interest.
The Olympic spirit does flow all around me, but I've never attached much of a story to it. The Shanghai Diaries have always been about my experiences in China, and the Olympics have, until recent events, never been a part of those tales except as a mass advertisement.
Certainly there is a political angle I could take with this year's games. The international community has taken more of an interest in this year's contest than I remember them taking in a long time. Protesters and pundits alike have all written long-winded, emotional screeds from political angles, and I'm sure there will be many more words written and spoken on that subject. I could add my own words to that pile from a somewhat inside angle. Yet I will continue to decline.
Since I started writing the Diaries I have tried to keep from making larger commentaries on the culture or politics of this land in which I live. I am a visitor and I write from that perspective. While living here certainly gives me a better view of China, it in no way makes me an expert and I have no desire to write like one. This goes double for politics.
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