h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Anyone else trying to work in London while this Olympic thing's going on?

Three days to go, so I thought I'd start a thread to capture what's happening on the street.

This morning's observation is that the tube's packed full of volunteers in their purple and red shirts - it's all very colourful.

I think you can also buy them from dodgy geezers on market stalls: http://www.sthelensreporter.co.uk/webimage/1.4508052.1335972036!image/409095115.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_595/409095115.jpg

Oh, and it's sunny and hot. This can't last.

So, what have you seen?

I've just bought flights for my daughter to visit while the 'Lympics is on. She's not going to the games, though. But I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the flights were about their usual price, no higher. I shall report back on her experience of getting around the city during that period.

My nephew has a spare ticket for some of the football, as his mate now cant go. He (nephew) is more than a little miffed that even though they've been planning to do this for over a year, at the last minute it's all falling apart.

I'll report back on Friday

Mol

Torch relay coming to Peckham tomorrow..doubt I'll go though as I'm not so excited by the torch thing..but still its nice for this area, and kids will love it.

That's a point - the torch relay's coming within 10 minutes walk of the office today, but I don't know when. I might pop over to see what's happening.

Ah - panic over - it's tomorrow.

Live link here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/torchrelay

My sister flew into Heathrow from Japan at the weekend. My mum, who came to pick her up, reported seeing signs of athletes arriving already: cards held up by people looking for certain disembarkers, tracksuited representatives of various countries: South Korea, Saudi Arabia...
I'm going down there to see the cycling with my (other) sister and her fiancee this coming weekend, and she suggested we seek out one of the (free entry) parks where large screens have been erected to show the opening ceremony on Friday night. It should be pretty cool.

Oh, also, in preparation for this, I bought the official Olympic Games Guide programme. It looks like an unusually thick magazine, so I thought it would be £5-6 at the most. It was £10!

For a cheaper option, I suspect most weekend newspapers will have free olympic supplements.

Personally, I am sick to death of it as I have been working on Olympic related stuff for the last 12 months......got an invite to the Opening ceromony but binned it. Could have had tickets, but turned them down ....... the irony is that the "2012" comedy on BBC 2 is so frighteningly real to what is going on.
Still - off on hols for 2 weeks so it will all be over when I get back

First cock up of the games (I think we can exclude the G4S thing - I encounter the clowns in day to day life and it really should have been seen coming).

North Korea womens football team walk off the pitch after the South Korean flag is displayed at Hamden Park at the start of the game.

Whoops.

PP.

So an hour's delay before N Korea get pasted by Columbia.

Don't know how that will be reported in Pyongyang.

Probably not at all.

PP

I clearly missed my vocation as a football pundit.

N Korea register a glorious victory out of love for the Great Successor Kim Jong-un, wining 2-0 after western dogs plot disrespectful attempt to disrupt masterful N Korean preparations using psychological warfare.

And more evidence of the need for goal-line technology.

PP

How long before they bring in flag-recognition technology?

I wanna do this: http://festival.london2012.com/events/9000961496

I'm also going to stick some (UK and Russian) flags up today. Our neighbours have already got some Team GB! bunting out, and I saw one of the big houses on the nearby common all covered in UK, Olympic and another flag that was all bunched up and so I couldn't work it out. The local Italian has its Italian flags out, as it does for all world sporting events, but on the whole there are a lot fewer flags about than I was expecting. Shops and such are less dressed up too, although perhaps that is a sponsorship thing. *sigh* Or perhaps I haven't been out and about enough this last week or so.

Pretty much all the billboards and buses have Olympic themed ads though. I'm quite enjoying that.

It has been said that Great Britain would only win selection for holding the games if it was London: I wonder how true that is? It is made out as if Great Britain is a one city entity with resources & opportunities focused there.

Really? But the various countries' teams have been training all over the place - we've had the Chinese gymnasts here in Belfast. And weren't the opening football matches held outside london?

I am going to support the games properly. When I get home I'm putting out McDonalds and Coca-Cola flags.

PP

London has hosted the Olympic Games on two occasions, in 1908 and 1948, and will host a third in 2012. The planned 2012 Summer Olympics will make London the first city to have hosted the modern Games of three Olympiads.

London is the only city in the United Kingdom to have ever hosted the Olympics; the United States is the only country to have hosted Summer Olympics on more occasions than the UK - four times (St. Louis, Los Angeles (twice), Atlanta).

The former Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said his primary motivation for initiating and lobbying for the city's bid was to develop the East End of London.

IOC members said during the bidding process that any other city, other than London, would have gone out early in the selection process, and that only London was a realistic candidate for the UK.

1992 Summer Olympic bids: 6 cities including Birmingham. Birmingham finish 5th.
1996 Summer Olympic bids: 6 cities including Manchester. Manchester finish 5th.
2000 Summer Olympic bids: 5 cities including Manchester. Manchester finish 3rd.
2012 Summer Olympic bids: 9 cities including London. London finish 1st.

Did the IOC members explain why they would only support London?

I suspect they didn't like the hotels oop north.