Olympics

When I was growing up, we had one television set in our house. Imagine it kids, one TV. It's shocking, I know. It wasn't that we were poor, it was based on principle. My father had some strange ideas, but he did have a set of principles that I came to know well. I digress. On our one television there was one channel: Sport. Except for the one time a week I could get up early enough on Saturday morning and quietly watch cartoons before my dad woke up. I remember the year 1984 very well. That was the year TSN started broadcasting in Canada. (For those who are not Canuckleheads, TSN is The Sports Network - Canada's first all-sports channel). I think I remember feeling like if anything would cause my parents divorce, this would be it.

The reason I remember the premier of TSN is that previous to its humble beginning, the television set in the living room had very often been shut off. Reading and music were prized much more highly than the mindless drivel that came over the boob tube. But Sport was even more highly valued in my home, and I'm pretty certain it all began with my paternal grandfather, who was a professional "sportsman". I'll save his history for another time, but it's enough to say that he played many sports well enough to actually make a decent living at it. This, and the fact that my grandfather died when my dad was 13, probably ingrained in that teenager the one-and-only romantic love that lasted his lifetime. Sport was king.

I could go on about the importance of sport in our house, but I think you have the necessary background for me to continue meandering towards my point. If sport was king in my household, the Olympics was the king of kings. As long as I can remember, I have always loved the Olympic games. Most people have a preference for summer over winter, or vice versa, as do I. Personally, I have an historical preference for the Winter Games, as it happens. And you might be saying to yourself, well, that's because you're Canadian, and Canada typically has much better results owing to your temperate climate. It's a consideration for sure, but only a minor one. The real reason is that the Winter games typically take place during the school year, and my Dad so loved sport that it was the one and only time that I was allowed to skive off school to stay home and watch telly. Oh, dear old Dad. I do miss him.

When Beijing, China was awarded the XXIX Olympic Games, to say that I was not at all impressed is an understatement. It wasn't just that they had gone up against Toronto and beat them out for hosting duties. No, that was not it. It wasn't so much that they didn't deserve them, because sport is for all people, no matter where they were born which is one of the best things about the games. No, my problem with China has always been mianzi - one of the concepts of "face" in Chinese social relations. Truth is important to me. It is one of the things that I value and hold higher than anything else. In fact, the pursuit of truth is what led to my absolute and complete comfort with being an atheist. When I heard the news that China had been awarded the highest pinnacle of sport, my first reaction was that sport and mianzi absolutely do not mix. (Not to mention that I think one of the main reasons why the people of China don't demand more from their government is down to the cultural acceptance of the concept of mianzi, but that is another digression that I will leave for a future rant). I hated the Olympics for the first time in my life. I looked forward to this Olympic Games with a mixture of dread and disgust. I just couldn't escape the thought that a concept that values lying in order to preserve public prestige just goes against everything that I think sport should represent.

As the Olympics drew closer a few weeks ago, I tried very hard to maintain my disinterested distaste and haughty demeanor. I didn't just hate these games, I wanted to hate them. I will admit to you now that I went out of my way to find things wrong with China hosting my precious games. I relished all the talk about the pollution in Beijing. My feelings of empathy for the citizens that live with the horrid air quality was quashed by my sheer delight that there were problems for China they could not hide from the rest of the world. In my mind I embraced all the talk of unrest in Tibet only because it fed my need to see all kinds of mianzi for China. I told myself that I was not going to watch the Olympics this year. I wasn't going to celebrate it, I wasn't going to look forward to it, I wasn't going to The Bay to buy my official Olympic gear. For the first time in my life, I wasn't going to add to my Olympic hat and pin collections. It was my own private boycott and I revelled in my determination to hate all things Olympic.

But something happened on the way to the stadium. (Ha, see what I did there?) It crept up on me stealthily. Years of my father's influence could not be dismissed so easily, it seemed. My mind started inventing all sorts of interesting reasons why I should just watch "a little" of the opening ceremonies. The chief reason that kept swirling around in my head was that if there was some spectacular debacle that contributed to loss of face for the Chinese authority, I would miss out on seeing it as it happened. But then, there was also the fact that a year ago I invested in digital HD cable and a large HD TV monitor. How much had I enjoyed this past Wimbledon, not only because my man Rafa won this fabled tournament for the first time, but because I got to see every pore on his beautiful face as he celebrated his fantastic victory. Imagine watching the Olympics for the first ever time, in massive and amazing HD? This question reverberated inside of me until I could deny it no more.

And so it began. At first, I was watching it only an hour or so a day, but near the end, all bets were off. I took no calls; I allowed my new pet blog project to fall by the wayside. I skived off work a few days. Even my favourite Facebook procrastination tools had to take a backseat. What on earth was my world coming to? The hate was gone. The men's Eight rowing gold, Michael Phelps, and Matthew Mitcham were among the highlights that made my heart soar. The love of sport had won out. I had to release my tight embrace of my cultural prejudice a little. I had to admit that I was wrong to try to dismiss the Olympics. I am doing so publicly here and now as my final assault against the value of mianzi. I will always accept a little loss of lian however, because that is a social concept that I think every culture actually finds moral value in.

Now if anyone wants me, I'll be down at The Bay. It all worked out in my favour in the end. I bet all this year's official Olympic gear is now on sale!