Let the games begin
This uni is a ghost town after 6pm in the summer. Nonetheless, a group of us LLMs found a place to eat dinner and watch NBC’s rerun of the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony. Spectacular stuff – China put on an incredible show. It was interesting and a pretty cool for me that we had people from several different countries and continents watching, although the patriotism during the parade of nations was muted at best. The US NBC commentors were constantly amusing – eg, “You may have heard of Malawi via Madonna!” (as if the only way for US audiences to be informed about African nation is to follow the offbeat exploits of their celebrities). Our dear leader, PM Rudd got some airtime as well, with the NBC guys dropping the factoid that Rudd is fluent in Mandarin. I also thought it interesting that the Australian team received a rousing reception.
1:12am (GMT -7.00) 
