Four Year Itch

Things are busy down in Brazil at the moment (although from an Australian perspective "up in Brazil" is a more accurate term).  Frankly you might have thought the Brazilians had enough to do what with their ongoing attempt to impeach their president on the rather surprising grounds that she's corrupt and has exceed her powers (I thought that was a Brazilian president's job description) and the fact that the zika virus is currently cutting a swathe through pregnant women (and since Brazil is both poor and Catholic that means most of them).  But now Brazil's cup of misery runneth over because suddenly tens of thousands of athletes (plus synchronised swimmers and beach volleyball players) have turned up demanding accommodation.

Yes the Olympics have turned up to add to the Brazilian's woes.  I suppose it seemed like a good idea at the time.  Neither the impeachment nor the zika virus had reared its ugly head when Rio de Janeiro put in its bid for the Olympics and thus the Olympic committee only had to consider whether rampant corruption, mass poverty, outrageous crime, environmental degradation and slipshod building methods were reason enough to prevent awarding them the games.  Apparently the answer was "No!".

So the Olympics turned up in Rio de Janeiro causing all sorts of ructions.  The arrival of the Russian team means the local gangs are now only the second largest drugs operation in the city and various pissant cry baby athletes are whining about minor issues like being mugged, robbed, turned into toxic avengers after contact with the water and having parts of their accommodation fall on them.  Slightly more serious issues have involved gunfire and some gymnast breaking a leg so badly it looked like silly putty.

But there are minor hiccoughs at every Olympics.  Beijing's Olympics would have been flawless if it hadn't been conducted by a murderous tyranny with less concept of human rights than the average compost heap.  The London Olympics were fine if you didn't mind the fact that they were held in London and lets not even get into having the Winter Olympics at Sochi where I understand they had to import civilisation specially for the occasion and took it away again afterwards.

Let me be the first to announce the Rio de Janeiro Olympics a staggering success.  From the inaugural butchering of a jaguar to the sight of a well muscled, half naked young man gleaming under a coat of oil supposedly carrying Tonga's flag but basically just there as eye candy we can say that this has been an Olympics to remember.  There is still some sport or athletics or something to go but who cares, lets just shut it down now before we run out of endangered species to kill.

Let me be the first to suggest that the next Olympics be held in Pyongyang or Dubbo.