Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics


Yesterday morning before school, I started to read The Gazette's review of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games. The article discussed how the Games suffered major devastation and setbacks, with the death of the Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili as well as horrible weather conditions and a technically flawed opening ceremony. Despite all of this, I believe that Canadians, both athletes and spectators, demonstrated how truly respectful, classy and talented they are. Winning fourteen gold medals is an amazing accomplishment and it is an understatement to say that Canadian pride has soared due to the achievements of our Canadian athletes. The article also explained that the closing ceremonies acted as a satirical representation of Canada, with dancing beavers, lumberjacks and gigantic mounties. Today, my friend Olivia showed me a wall post from people in the U.S. who ridiculed the closing ceremonies for being tacky and predictable. This made me angry but I also had to laugh because they entirely missed the point of the entire ceremony, as the purpose was to expose the stereotypes of Canada that people like those in the U.S. take seriously. Although I have to admit that William Shatner and Catherine O'Hara were somewhat embarrassing, the closing ceremonies did do a good job of poking fun at major Canadian stereotypes. Overall, I believe that the Vancouver Olympics were a success despite the major challenges they were faced with and Canadians should be very proud of our country's hospitality as well as its athletes.

photo courtesy of google images