Vancouver Winter Olympics

Winter Olympic Games have been going on for a week and a half in Vancouver. We've been watching a good portion of it every evening after work.

It started with horror: on the morning of the opening day Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili crashed during the training run, flew out of the luge track and hit the metal pole. He died on the way to hospital. I thought his death will mar the games to the end. Unfortunately, all the excitement on the Olympic arenas soon pushed the tragedy to the back of the mind, and although it's not forgotten, it is also not being mentioned any longer. There were some other memorable moments: the first Canadian gold of the games in men's moguls by Alex Bilodeau on day 2; lousy performance of the men's hockey team, who barely squeezed past Finland on penalty shots, spectacularly lost to the Americans and then came around and dismantled powerful team Russia in the quarterfinal game 7:3; women's two-man bobsled teams (beats me, I don't know why it isn't called two-women bobsled) took gold and silver yesterday; and today women's hockey team beat USA for gold.

Two more stories we'll remember: Slovenian cross country skier Petra Majdic fell into a gully while warming up for 1.2 km sprint. She suffered four broken ribs and a collapsed lung. But, when she was pulled from the hole, she refused to go to the hospital and demanded to be taken to the start line for her race. She went on to win bronze medal and had to be helped onto the podium at the medal ceremony.

Another heroic story is of Canadian female figure skater Joannie Rochette, whose mother died of a heart attack two days before Joannie's competition. The mother was in Vancouver to watch her daughter skate at the Olympics. Joannie decided to skate on and delivered the best short program of her career. She was composed and almost flawless during the skate. But, when the music stopped, the tears started streaming down her face. She wasn't alone--many in the crowd, which gave her standing ovations, cried along.

There are few more days of the Olympic excitement left, the closing ceremony is on Sunday. The whole country now lives for men's hockey. Someone wrote on Twitter that if the men's team wins gold, all other failures in other sports won't matter. Sadly, the only sport Canadians recognize is hockey. All other fantastic athletes and their miraculous achievements are here to fill in the time between hockey games.