Olympic Magic

I have finally watched some of NBC's sliced, diced, edited, and narrated monoply broadcast of the 2008 Olympics Opening Ceremony in Beijing.

I must say, it is an impressive display of coordination, fat wallets, gunpowder, subtle military might, and buried communism.

My mom, however, was beyond impressed. She was screaming, both in delight and at my dad to record the show. "Oh my goodness." She said it "was the best show in 5,000 years" and that "no other country can beat this".

Larry Niven wrote that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." My mom must have thought Beijing was Walt Disney's wonderful world of magic.

Of course, it was my job to bring her back down to earth and tell her that is in fact very possible for another country to do just as well. It is merely a matter of whether or not the country's government is willing to undertake such a task. It is even possible for future Olympics to surpass this year's, since they would know just how far they would need to go. Afterall, competition is how the world gets better.

Following more reminders of how important it is to learn Chinese, my mom also said that Jackie Chan was writing a song and that he was very patriotic, unlike me. This is proves how very ignorant she is. Jackie Chan is very patriotic. However, he is a Chinese citizen*. I am an American citizen, despite being of Chinese heritage, and if I was patriotic towards China, then I would be committing treason, which is the highest offense and punishable by death.

But enough for now. I'll go enjoy the rest of the opening ceremonies and try to ignore the human rights crises of China.