Friday, September 6, 2013

SPO 2020 Olympics

One of my favorite affairs to blog about are the Summer Olympics, and one of my favorite posts of all times is this one analyzing the possible 2016 host cities http://cal337.blogspot.hk/2009/10/spo-2016-olympics.html. Well it's been four years and the IOC will select the 2020 host city in Buenos Aires on September 7. I've heard absolutely no buzz from the event this time around and I wonder if anyone cares. Well even if they don't, I do and I'm going to blog about it, mostly for the sake of tradition. In case you didn't know, and you probably didn't, the candidate host cities are Istanbul, Madrid and Tokyo.  Candidacies are declared years in advanced (Rome, Baku and Doha were rejected or pulled out) and as you'll see, each candidate city has seen developments since their original bids that will hurt them.

(See also http://cal337.blogspot.hk/2010/12/world-cup-bids.html for World Cup bids)

The factors that I'm interested in are not the same as the factors for IOC voters. I care about how cool the city is, how well prepared its infrastructure is to support the Olympics, how recently the city/country/region has hosted the Games, how novel it would be, how interesting it'd be to attend, how much it would help the city, how much the region loves sports etc. The IOC cares mostly about how much money that city government has used to bribe its voting members.  And to lesser extents infrastructure and government relations and financial windfall.  Here is how I would vote if I were an IOC member, but I'll conclude by telling you who will actually win.

3) Madrid
The Spanish capital bid for the 2012 and 2016 Games as well, where it finished 2nd to Rio de Janeiro. If you clicked on the first link above you'll have noticed that I ranked it last back then as well. I don't want to appear as a Madrid hater, but it's still a less exciting city for me than the other two.  In the last 4 years, the Spanish economy has really tanked, with national unemployment rate exceeding 27%, youth unemployment exceeding 50%, although you wouldn't be able to tell from the €100million transfer fee paid by Real Madrid for Gareth Bale.  The city of Madrid has debts of 7.4 billion, and its bid for the games was dubbed "The Hunger Games" in a Spanish left wing opinion piece. That said, the bid is remarkably frugal, offering a $5 billion Olympic Games. In comparison, some estimates put Beijing's spendings at over $40 billion for the 2008 Games. Previous experience has shown that the Summer Olympics do not make the city money in the short run, and probably don't in the long run either.  Sure, the Olympics bring in construction and speed up infrastructure development and may create jobs in the years leading up to the Games. It'll of course attract swarms of tourists (even after the Games). However, in Spain, it's not clear that more construction is a good thing. Sorry that was a low blow (or a high blow)?  


Madrid does have some world class facilities, including Real Madrid's home stadium Santiago Bernabéu.  It's a great sports country with the world's best football team (the national team). It's already got a great infrastructure and is a world class high speed rail hub, the recent train disaster not withstanding. As a tourist attraction, it's got a lot going for it as a beautiful city that lots of people love to visit (top 5 most visited city in Europe) and it's not an overcrowded behemoth. In terms of recent regional redundancy, Barcelona hosting the 1992 Games is probably largely irrelevant now, but Western Europe held the 2012 Olympics in London. For an Olympics that keeps trying to branch out, keeping the host cities Eurocentric goes against that philosophy. Still the biggest hurdle Madrid faces is the financial crisis. You can't have a city that takes on massive debt to host a sporting event, and you can't have swathes of homeless people bumming around during the Games.  Will the committee members think that the Spanish government can afford the Games? Will they think the Games can be a boon to the beleaguered economy?  Will the 3rd consecutive bid be a charm?

2) Tokyo
Tokyo also bid for the 2016 Games. Repeat bids historically help, as infrastructure gets laid out and plans get to become more detailed and refined. Tokyo is the only previous host in this competition, although the 1964 games are ancient history (Detroit was a candidate city that year, dear God). As the world's biggest city, they probably deserve to be a multiple host city, and they certainly have the infrastructure prepared including some stadiums built for co-hosting the 2002 World Cup. In fact, Tokyo is billing themselves as the safe choice. The Rio Games are behind in their preparation, as was London slightly and Athens majorly in 2004. Tokyo shouldn't have much trouble pulling together the funds and getting a precise, reliable Japanese-style Olympics. The real wild card is the Fukushima disaster, which puts radioactive leaks into the equation. Whether or not scientific evidence can prove that there will be no lingering effects by 2020, the conception out there is decidedly mixed.  Some athletes will be scared of competing in Japan and some committee members will reflect this in their vote. Beijing held the Games in 2008 and Pyeonchang of South Korea will hold the Winter Olympics in 2018, but that's really not too much exposure for the continent holding most of the world's population.

Will committee members put faith in the Japanese to put a reliable, successful Summer Olympics? Will Japanese ingenuity make these Games a very special affair? Or is the fear of radioactivity too much to overcome?

1) Istanbul
If you know me, you know that I like diversity and spreading these sort of events to parts of the world where it has never been before. It's no surprise that I'd rank Istanbul #1. However, I'm not alone with this mindset. The 2008 and 2016 Summer Olympics, 2014 Winter Olympics and 2010, 2014, 2018 and 2022 World Cups are all spreading their events to uncharted territories. Istanbul would be remarkable mainly for bringing the Games to a Muslim-majority nation and a Middle Eastern nation for the first time. Turkey is an up and coming country with some similarities to China in 2001 (when the Beijing bid was won). Most excitingly, placing the Games in Istanbul would have the novelty of spreading events across Europe and Asia.  Istanbul previously bid for the 2000, 2004, 2008 and 2012 Games and is very familiar to committee members. Can the IOC reject Istanbul again??

What's Istanbul's recent Achilles' heel (an ancient Achilles' heel perhaps being Achilles himself)? Well the conflict in Syria probably shouldn't be a factor by 2020, but it's definitely in people's minds right now and refugees from Syria have been spilling over into neighboring Turkey. God forbid there's conflict so far down the road, but I think there is a red line that you can't host the Olympics with a war raging nearby. Istanbul is also under question for its handling of protesters in its public park this past year. It's thus seen as the riskier host city with potentially great intriguing reward. I think it'd be awesome, it's an unbelievably beautiful and special city and would make for a memorable Olympics. Istanbul has hosted major sporting events before, including the 2010 FIBA World Championships, and it'll probably be up for the challenge as much as Rio de Janeiro is.  The Olympics would bring a crowning achievement and recognition to a city with storied history that much of the world needs to relearn. Bring the Games to the Bosphorus or you'll have a lot of people giving up on the IOC cold turkey.

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In addition to the host city, the IOC will vote to add one more sport. The main contenders are baseball/softball, squash and wrestling, 2 of which we're talking about re-adding. Wrestling was unjustly removed last year, a shocking victim of the Olympics cutting weight, because apparently some IOC members don't associate wrestling as one of the quintessential Olympic sports. Wrestling is international, with medalists from all sorts of countries including Kazakhstan, India, Japan, Cuba and Mongolia. It's difficult, impressive and athletic as hell, and it's not a bad sport to watch in person or on TV as long as the announcers are competent. Really I don't have much to add. Wrestling is a perfect Olympic sport, I wrestled in high school, and it better be added back to the 2020 Games.

The three cities involved are all awesome. I really believe these Games will be great to watch in any host city and I'd love to attend and eat tapas, kebabs or sushi. Tokyo however is an overwhelming favorite, and even though Madrid is catching up, expect to see the Games in Japan.

Thursday, September 5, 2013

No Lack of Backpacks to Track

So this was what riding on a motorcycle ride felt like. I was sitting behind a Burmese man whose name I couldn't really pronounce, cruising 50mph down a dirt road that doesn't show up on Googlemaps (I checked). Of the new experiences I was hoping to have on this vacation, a Hells Angel ride was not one of them. It would not be the most unexpected new experience though, but we'll get to that later.
We would later pass her

On Easter Sunday, we had taken the early bus from Bagan to Kalaw, which similar to our flight, was predominantly white tourists. We were very much traveling by the seat of our pants - Jackie was leaving Burma much sooner than I and her tight schedule motivated us to fit in as much adventure as we could in as little time as possible. We were hoping to hike from Kalaw to Inle Lake, a 2 or 3 day affair we'd read, and hopefully could start as soon as we hit the ground in Kalaw, despite not having made any bookings.  It was an improvisational type of trip which is the best kind of trip.

When we reached Kalaw, any worry I had at booking a hiking tour was instantly acquiesced by the group of tour promoters swarming our arrival.  Kalaw's main industry clearly was hiking to Inle Lake. We were led to a hostel while trying to figure out scheduling. It was around 4pm and they told us it was too late to embark on the hike - we looked at a bunch of maps of the routes and nothing would work. When I offered to say we could hike fast and sleep on the road, the hostel runner Robin laughed and brought up snakes. Robin suggested hopping on for a motorcycle ride to the last checkpoint, and then doing a 1 day hike and reach Inle by the following evening. So we met our drivers, divided 3 helmets among the 4 of us (guess who didn't get one), "checked in" our larger bags to magically reappear when we reached Inle. I took my valuables with me.

Robin for the record was one of many very very interesting people we'd meet on this leg of the journey. Robin's family were all descended from Punjabi Sikh Indians, but he was 3rd generation Burmese. He spoke Punjabi, Hindi, Burmese, Nepali and English (semi-fluently) and "some of the hill tribe dialects." He had a large family with 3 boys and they were all helping to run the hostel and tour business. They seemed to be doing well but he had never left the country. He said that when he was younger he had really wanted to see the world, but now he says running this hostel, the world comes to him. People from all over the world stay there, and he reads CNN, so he feels he has a pretty good beat on the world. He probably had a point, but I still hope he gets to travel.

So there we are on our motorbikes, cruising down some very rural areas. The landscape was beautiful with low flowing mountains and vegetation that flushed the tan brown and green parts of the color palette. On one occasion I saw what looked like a controlled forest fire. The ride was different than I expected - there were side handles, so I didn't have to clutch the strange old Burmese driver for dear life. With the milder weather of higher altitude and the bike speeding through the breeze, thermal comfort was ideal.

The ride was about an hour and a half, but it didn't feel like real time. I felt suspended along the space time continuum, with unfamiliar scenery flying by me. The motors were loud enough that I felt alone - despite the three people with me, I felt like they couldn't intrude into my moments, that I had all the serenity I needed.

The road twisted and turned and rose through several mountaintops, before the drivers slowed without warning and pulled in front of a monastery.

We met lots of European backpackers on our trip. There was the Dutch girl who only just graduated high school and was backpacking before studying medicine, the Danish couple who had one year left of graduate school, and the German guy who might just have been unemployed. There were lots of similarities to their stories and all of them had been on the road for several months and to several Southeast Asian countries - no backpacker starts in Myanmar. We had only scratched the surface of bizarre characters. At Kalaw we met Frank the French engineer, who had done projects all over the world and been to China 7 times, including months of wandering through Sichuan and Yunnan, and even more unbelievably only knew a few words of Chinese.  He also talked about his Cambodian girlfriend, who he met while he was alone and bored at a bar there. His girlfriend was a waitress at the bar and equally bored - and then he pulled out his ringed hand and told us they were engaged.  They'd only been dating for a year, with much of that time long distance, but he said that her family wants her to get married soon and "some compromises have to be made." I'm not sure if the word compromise has different connotations in French, or really if the concept of marriage is completely different to this guy, but I found the whole story a bit absurd.

Our guide, who arrived with two hikers, was named Sunny and also a cool character. He was also a 3rd generation inhabitant of Myanmar, with his roots in Nepal. He mentioned wanting to visit there sometime though he didn't have a passport and it was very difficult to obtain one, and also spoke about a year working in Bangkok previously. Those two stories didn't make sense to me until he told about his journey to the border and the three stages of bribes he needed to cross the border, on what was a well-established illegal migration route supplying Thailand with many laborers and domestic workers. He had worked at a tailor shop for a Chinese merchant, met a Nepalese-Burmese girl who became his girlfriend and had overall a positive experience in Bangkok, although he did mention being extremely lonely and sad at the start.  He had come back after a year because his father wanted him back, I forget the reason exactly, and started leading these hikes. He looked young but I assumed he was in his mid 20's - I was shocked to learn he was 19. I'm still not used to dealing with people younger than me, particularly people I hire (sounds strange to type that), but I shouldn't have been so surprised. We met so many teenagers and even pre-teens working in the tourism industry that I wonder what the nation-wide high school graduation rate is.  Sunny did graduate from high school, at the age of 16. He had some strong opinions of politics, partially shaped by his experiences in Bangkok and his interactions with tourists. He was critical of Bangkok's culture-less expansion that hadn't particularly helped the poor, and was hopeful that Myanmar would "open up, but not so fast." It would "make the poor people only sad."

And then there was Michael. Michael had grown up in the deep south during the height of segregation (but had made a pact at the age of 6 to not speak with a Southern twang, and didn't). He graduated from UNC in 1968 as an ROTC and was soon piloting planes in the Vietnam War. He worked with Continental Airlines after the war and the company was bought by United after 5 years. He was laid off, but his retirement package was insanely generous, and he's flown free on United since and 10% on most other airlines. 10%, not 10% off. So he's been retired for a while and basically been traveling nonstop. He met his French girlfriend Claire in the Gaza Strip (an underrated single's hotspot) where they were both protesting on behalf of the Free Palestine movement (which he got involved with in part because of the injustice he saw under Jim Crowe laws). They said they met in December, and since they were rather advanced in age I figured they meant December 1979, but no, they meant last December. Michael was full of stories, but I'll remember him for the story he added to our trip.

The monastery was devoid of electricity except for a few solar powered light bulbs, my first encounter with renewable energy used for off grid supply. The shower was hand pumped by a smiling novice monk into a bucket and used behind concrete walls about shoulder high. Lucky we hadn't hiked and didn't need a shower. The rest of the group were exhausted, especially Michael and Claire, and they gritted through the shower/bathe/bucket pour.

Darkness quickly settled and we ha a candlelight dinner with Michael, Claire and Sunny. A cook had driven along for the tour and prepared a very nice simple meal, pleasing to both the palate and the digestive system. Michael and Claire retired early due to their fatiguing hike, and Jackie and I chattered on with Sunny for another hour or two. This was when we learned about his experiences in Bangkok, his political views, his schooling, his family and the surprising fact that he has Facebook (about 1% of Myanmar has access to the internet - even Mongolia has 20%). We met the female guide leading the other group, who was also Nepalese Burmese.  I forget her name but she had been friends with Sunny since childhood and like so much of Asia had gotten interested in Korean dramas. She subsequently studied Korean in university and occasionally guides to Korean tourists. When we finally decided to let Sunny a rest, we strolled into the monastery. Cots had been laid out onto the floor and split among thin curtain dividers. Each divider probably held about eight cots and there were around eight dividers. Since only two small groups were on this hike, Jackie and I had our own divider to ourselves - or so we thought. 

I had just brushed and tiptoed in when I heard some rhythmic heavy breathing. The breathing crescendoed slightly and became distinctly audible, and was soon accompanied by the sound of bodies rolling on the cots. I looked up at Jackie, who was completely still and intently listening. Is this really happening? Is this what I think it is? I whispered to Jackie. She responded with a nod and a smile. Who do you think it is? I asked. As the couple next to us made themselves more known, the paper thin dividers suddenly seemed so inadequate. We heard enough of the male voice to deduce that we were likely a few feet away from Michael, who I guess did have a generous retirement package that allowed him to be a frequent rider. The couple was definitely trying to keep quiet - but not nearly enough. The identities were secured for me when after a rather subdued finale, I heard a woman with a strong French accent say, "I thought you were tired. You found your second wind!" My immediate thoughts were 1) I did not need to know that 2) "second wind" is a really impressive colloquial phrase for a foreign English speaker to know.

I saw Michael outside the monastery at 7am the next morning. Unbelievably, his first words to me were "How did you sleep?"  "Fine. Yourself?" His response, I swear, was nothing more than a knowing smile. I hung my head in amazement and walked away. I resolved never to repeat what Michael and Claire did, and certainly not on Easter Sunday in a Buddhist Monastery.