Friday, July 27, 2012

Spirit of the Olympics

The nice thing about blogging about eating and running is that when you successfully experiment with then blog about dishes, you have a readily available cookbook so that you can recreate the meal or something like the meal.

Tonight, I have decided to make a pizza with a provolone, gouda, and muenster cheese combination.  I couldn't quite remember my dough recipe, so I looked it up.  Pretty simple.

Another thing you get to do is to share information and encouragement.  The 2012 Olympics start tonight with the opening ceremonies.  I have been reading a bit about the 1972 Munich Olympics when the games were overshadowed by a horrific hostage crisis when eleven Israeli athletes and coaches, a West German police officer, and five terrorists were killed.  I've also been reading a little bit about when the United States boycotted the 1980 Moscow Olympics to protest the U.S.S.R.'s invasion of Afghanistan.


What's beautiful about the spirit of the Olympic games and of sport is the comaraderie of the athletes.  It wasn't the athletes who caused the massacre of the 1972 Olympics and it wasn't the athletes who boycotted the games in 1980- that was world politics at its worst.  Somehow the Olympics embody the spirit that is both above and deeply entwined in the politics.  The games are symbolic of peaceful competition and a glimpse of how things could be if we all just recognized the pure beauty of sport.


While many of these athletes have lucrative endorsement contracts, they still have to perform at their peak as they compete against the best athletes in the world.  At the opening ceremonies tonight, expect to see all the athletes huddled together with their own countrymen.  But in the closing ceremonies, it is a hodgepodge of athletes, all from different countries, mingling and celebrating together.  Expect to see enemies become friends.  Expect to see what the world would look like if we would all just come together in peace.

Whether you like sport or not, please enjoy the games, and pray for peace in the world, because there are already too many politics at play.

London 2012 for more about the schedule and the games

Livestrong Philly Challenge to support me and Team Fish in our fight against cancer on August 19

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