Did Vladimir Putin think that reporters wouldn’t notice that the hotel rooms they were scheduled to stay in during the Sochi Olympic games weren’t finished?
Did he think it would enhance the experience of the visiting world to not be able to use or drink the water, or flush toilet paper down the toilet?
Did he think it would be cozy and homey to check into a hotel via the owner’s room, instead of a lobby that didn’t exist?
If I got to sit down with the leader of Russia, I’d ask him. I’d ask him if the debacle that already is the Sochi Olympics is really going to turn a page in the history of his country and reestablish Russia on the global stage.
Until you get to an international event, you don’t really know what’s going on in the host city. The reports conflict and are spun, and the picture painted is murky at best. But eventually, the curtain is pulled back.
The games start today. The opening ceremony is tomorrow. Athletes, reporters, fans and delegations are descending on Sochi, and all the questions about the readiness of the Black Sea coast city to host the world are being answered.
Reporters in Sochi spent yesterday tweeting photos from their predicament. We saw hotel rooms with no doorknobs and faucets spraying brown water. We saw modems dangling from ceilings and curtains falling down. Mostly, we heard about people who simply have nowhere to stay because their hotel hasn’t been finished yet.
CNN sports producer Harry Reekie said that his company booked 11 hotel rooms, but after a day in Sochi, only one is available for use.
It’s not a pretty picture that’s being painted. Reports say that a pest control company in Sochi has been contracted to round up and kill stray dogs – prevalent in the city – all throughout the games.
I guess I don’t feel as bad for the dogs as the people who have been thrown out of their homes and neighborhoods because the slums of the city would be unsightly for the games.
File this in the unsightly category: Uncovered manholes lining the streets.
Maybe all of the hubbub over the city’s unpreparedness isn’t such a bad thing, considering the immediacy and intimacy of not being able to use water distracts reporters from the human rights violations that have been perpetrated recently by the Russian government, or the terror threat looming over these games.
Don’t blame the Russian people – they have no say in this matter.
These are the Putin Games.
By comparison, the Beijing Games of 2008 look like a kindergartener’s tea party.
China spent $10 billion dollars to put those summer games on. A lot, right?
Wrong, because Russia has spent over $50 billion dollars on the Winter Games, more than any other single Olympics in the history of the games, and more than all the previous Winter Olympics combined.
It is estimated that over $30 billion of that money has gone to Putin and his people in kickbacks and bribes, and we know that over $7 billion has gone to building an 18-mile road, the longest of its kind in the world.
What does Putin think he’s playing, Settlers of Catan?
It’s no wonder they couldn’t quite finish the hotels. The Russian government spent almost $3 billion dollars building a spa on the outskirts of the centralized area of the games.
And this while the city of Sochi, historically poor and underdeveloped, suffers.
NBC, who will be providing the most comprehensive coverage of the Olympic games ever, has a huge, mega-rich stake in the Olympics being a success. They are as invested in the Olympic brand as anyone.
It’s a lock that people will watch. The controversy and uncertainty of the games, plus what’s good about the Olympics – the competition, the stories, the patriotism, guarantees that. But it will be interesting to see if NBC covers what’s really going in Sochi.
There will be news throughout that goes beyond the games. Is NBC interested? Or will they be content with protecting an image of the Olympic games and spirit that was muddied and debunked long ago.
The IOC – International Olympic Committee – gave these Olympics to Sochi.
The IOC says on their official website that their role is, in part, to: ‘To encourage and support the promotion of ethics in sport,” to “To encourage and support initiatives blending sport with culture and education,” to “To act against any form of discrimination affecting the Olympic Movement,” and to “endeavor to place sport at the service of humanity and thereby to promote peace.”
Sound familiar, IOC? The exact opposite has happened in Sochi, and the committee is nowhere to be found.
On a similar note, FIFA has given Russia the 2018 World Cup. I assume that they’ll be similarly quiet if things don’t go well from here on in with that competition.
The legacy of the Sochi games will be determined in the next two weeks. There are always bumps in the road on the way to kicking off the event, whatever it is – though they aren’t usually this big or grave.
Hopefully everything goes smoothly and we get to enjoy the Olympics. No one involved should have to put up with all the outside noise Russia has drummed up. But as the curtain is pulled further and further back, things look worse and worse.
That stuff cannot and will not be ignored.
Now, it’s show time. Smile for the camera, Russia. But don’t think that the rest of the world won’t notice what’s going on in the background.
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