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Fun And Games

by | 12th, August 2004

‘SUCH are the advancements in human cloning that can we really be sure the figure who yesterday arrived in Greece for the Olympic Games is George Bush?

‘Who wants chilli sauce?’

Scientists could even miss out the odd chromosome and still replicate the leader of the free world with some ease.

The Telegraph’s story of how the creature that passes for the American president will be staying aboard the yacht of Greek billionaire Spyros Latsis is of interest.

However, the more likely place where leading-edge science and the Olympics will collide is on the athletics track.

Such is the high level of cheating, the feeling is that, if all drugs takers were removed from the sporting arena, the only person left within the cauldron would be the bloke who raises the red and white flags by the long jump sandpit, and even he’s a borderline case.

But let’s not dwell on the negatives – let’s be higher, faster, stronger, and run like Ben Johnson on speed…because the news is that the stadium’s going to flood.

The Times has happened upon some information about what we can expect when the Games opens tomorrow.

Lois Jacobs, a British events expert, is the brains behind the £21m opening ceremony, in which gallons of water will be allowed to flood part of the Olympic stadium and a fireball will race across the surface.

Those still waiting by London’s Tower Bridge for the Millennium River of Fire will be excused for snorting a cynical chuckle.

But Jacobs is confident that she will succeed where four years ago Ken Livingstone and a man with a match and some kerosene failed.

But Jacobs has more worries than just the fire – indeed, anyone planning to be in the stadium when it floods and then catches light should think about their will and the hereafter.

The Times hears from an unnamed Albanian who worked on the stadium, and his words are less than reassuring.

“We have been praying it does not rain because we ran out of concrete half way through,” says the insider. “There is more sand in that stadium than concrete.”

And since he doesn’t mean the aforesaid long jump pit, the concern is that, once flooded, the entire stadium will slip off its foundations and gently roll out to sea.

And if it crashes into George Bush’s boat, causing it to sink, don’t worry – there’ll be another Bush along in a minute…’



Posted: 12th, August 2004 | In: Broadsheets Comment | TrackBack | Permalink