Sunday, February 28, 2010

A Bit of a Rant and I'm Glad They're Done...

I had some fun watching the Olympics in my sweatpants during reading week, but I'm glad they're done. I love Canada for a lot of reasons, but Canadians have been acting way too American lately! What is with the spirit of domination? This week, I actually overheard a Canadian say in all seriousness, "People who don't cheer for Canada shouldn't be allowed to live here." That doesn't scream "welcoming country of great diversity" to me.

Also, the "Own the Podium" campaign was lame. Talk about eating your words, then spitting them back out and trying to rearrange them more favorably. How about simply treating your athletes well and then letting their performances speak for themselves?

Hockey I understand. Canada should be possessive and obsessive about hockey because it really is their game. And I'm glad they got their gold (I like to think that when my home country lost, it made me a more popular person here in Canada). Actually, I probably would have cheered for your team if the whole "Own the Podium" thing wasn't so annoying. Wouldn't be the first time I cheered against an American team, after all.

Anywho, a few positives to finish off... Canada, your athletes did great, your hockey team showed up when they needed to, and you showed great national pride. Also, I loved watching what the Americans did in dominating the podium, my favorite Seattle boy Apolo Anton Ohno for what he accomplished in his own medal count, and of the grit that our young underdog hockey players put into their games, not to mention Ryan Miller's incredible tournament in goal.

OK, now that I have conducted my own personal closing ceremony, I am DONE with the Olympics and I don't care how badly people want to talk about hockey tomorrow.

4 comments:

kinneyland said...

I wish the men's game wasn't hyped so much. For me there were many bigger moments of the game. And the women's gold medal game was played much better, but what can you do?

Canada Wins said...

We DID own the podium. Americans came up with the 'total medal count' to not lose to the soviets who were dominating gold medals back in the 70s.

Every country in the world counts WINNING an event as 1st PLACE!!! WE are the most winning nation in the history of the winter games.

2nd place: 1st loser.
3rd place: 2nd loser.

You WIN Gold, LOSE silver!!!

Welcome to a **hopefully** changed, more united, more prideful, Canada!!! Because we are the greatest nation on earth, in winter olympics, that is!!! hahaha


GO canada!!!!

Canada Wins x2 said...

PS see this link of the medal table from an overseas/international perspective

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Winter_Olympics_medal_table


notice canada 1st, germany 2nd, USA 3rd.

Ashley Ronnell said...

This is exactly the type of American sounding gloating that has been driving me CRAZY. I am proud of our American athletes (and if you want to categorize things like that, I am also proud of the two thirds of the podium that we owned).