YeinJee's Asian blog

Asian Culture, Lifestyle and Entertainment

Olympic Games

Squash Olympic Bid

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A video to promote squash, featuring world #1 Ramy Ashour of Egypt and Nicol David of Malaysia. The World Squash Federation (WSF) has been working for a decade for the racquet sport to be included in the Olympic Games (next for 2020)…

For various reasons there are limited numbers of sports that could feature in the Olympics (which are reviewed after every edition). There’s one slot left for the 2020 Games which will be decided by an IOC poll later this year.

While squash makes some fair points the voting is often decided by political and financial reasons. If the sport is not popular in one of the richer (or powerful) countries the chance of inclusion looks dim, regardless of how popular it is elsewhere.

South Korea’s Pyeongchang to host 2018 Winter Olympics

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South Korea’s Pyeongchang has been chosen as the host city for the 2018 Winter Olympics by the International Olympic Committee on Wednesday after winning the majority (63/95) of the first round votes ahead of Germany’s Munich and France’s Annecy. Samsung Group is quick to respond with a congratulatory ad…

Pyeongchang – a popular winter vacation and skiing destination – will become the first non-Japanese Asian city to host the Winter Olympics. This is Pyeongchang’s third consecutive bidding attempt for the event after losing to Vancouver and Sochi for the 2010 and 2014 games… third time lucky?

Iran claims London Olympics logo spells Zion

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London 2012 Olympics logoIran has threatened to boycott the London Olympics unless the organisers replace the official logo, which Tehran claims spells out Zion – a word often used as a synonym for Jerusalem and the Biblical land of Israel.

The logo, a jagged representation of the year 2012 (when the London Olympics will be held), has been criticised to resemble many things, from swastika to sexual act, but the Iranian government argues it represents a veiled pro-Israeli conspiracy.

I wonder what took the Iranian that long to file a complain, as the Zion rumour had surfaced not long after the logo was unveiled in 2007. The resemblance becomes more apparent when the logo is spread out…

London 2012 Olympics logo Zion resemblance

Not that I agree with Iran or anything, it looks more like a coincident instead of conspiracy. I can understand though, that some Arabic nations could be a bit sensitive with this considering their strained relationship with Israel.

Wenlock & Mandeville – London 2012 Olympic Mascots

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Meet Wenlock and Mandeville, the London 2012 Olympic & Paralympic mascots.

Wenlock Mandeville London 2012 Olympic mascots

Wenlock is named after Much Wenlock, a small town which inspired the modern Olympic Games; while Mandeville is after Stoke Mandeville Hospital, the precursor of the Paralympic Games.

The characters “were created from the last two drops of British steel used for the London 2012 Olympic Stadium,” kinda confusing but I guess they want to show gratitude to the workforce who built the venues.

I prefer old school animal-like mascots, but I can accept a bit of new concept as long as it’s cute or cool… unfortunately the London mascots couldn’t fit into either of the requirements, simply not my cup of tea.