What have oranges got to do with winning an Olympic gold medal in polluted Beijing?
Try this great feature by Deborah Zabarenko to find out.
The world’s athletes, training for years for the Games, are trying to find how to avoid wheezing their way through events.
Masks, special diets, or training camps in Japan are all part of the answer.
Beijing is not the first smoggy city to hold the Olympics — pollution was a worry in Seoul in 1988 and in Los Angeles in 1984.
So maybe the Olympics should only be held in “clean” cities?
Or maybe the Olympics will — long after any coughing athletes have left — benefit the health of millions of people living in Beijing because China is trying to crack down on air pollution?
What do you think?
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6 comments so far
Orange Fruit is Colourful. Yello, Green,Light Red,Parrot yellow etc etc.
Orange is good for Health. Energy drink also.
Orange skin is More Antiseptic Value.
Just take skin of Orange and rub all over the skin, Face ( Do not show to Eyes, you may cry)
Hand & Legs and all parts of Body.
Wait for 10 Minites. Take bath. Soap is not require. all dust, oil, sweating smell,bad odur will go out.
You will feel fresh.
- Posted by s.sankara subbuYes, Olympics should only be held in “clean” cities.
Olympics and other Games should not be held in country, which has nuclear bombs.
- Posted by Ajitall athletes should be allowed to take performance enhancing drugs to counteract the effects of pollution. It might actually get people watching the olympics again
- Posted by McShabbyWe need to tackle with the pollution of those corrupted who run the IOC. They got blinded by the money. By doing so, there will be no worry for athletes to go and play games at the place where the environment and people are so much polluted and corrupted.
- Posted by parkmountHow long does it take before we realize our world is driven by fear? Is our fear of China big enough that we will give it up and say, “What up?”
- Posted by PaulThe Olympics are just around the corner and the relief efforts in SiChuan are endeavours worthy of praise. China’s newly constructed cities of steel and chrome are things of beauty, sitting on top of rubbles of brick, mortar and wood. If you look a little deeper, however, underneath the newly gilded exterior, you might notice people, China’s people, oozing with blood.
In the effort to construct these beautiful monstrocities, China’s had to make a lot of changes. They’ve torn down thousand year old buildings, moved businesses, moved homes, moved families, and moved people. And the ones doing the dirty work? The construction companies. I’m sure everyone reading this has heard of the word “Chai Qian”, meaning to take apart in an organized fashion. Well, it’s not organized!
Construction companies hire hoodlums off of the street, arm them with 2 by 4’s, and send them out to homes in droves, “asking” the residents to move out. The hoodlums smash into homes and bring papers for the residents to sign, with wordings that few, if any, can understand. Those who sign are given a couple hundred dollars and shooed off of the Company’s new property. And the ones who don’t sign, the ones who just want to be left alone? They’re beaten. It doesn’t matter if the residents are children, elderly, retired, or employed; they’re all beaten with the brutality and voracity of convicts out to make money.
All in an effort to make China more beautiful.
And the construction companies? They build high rises in places of the ugly old buildings, adding a new shadow to the hazy smog filled skyline. Selling each square meter of property for thousands times more than what they paid. It’s not politics, it’s not people, it’s just business as usual.
I can’t say that I’m completely unbiased because this morning I got a call and found out that my aunt was beaten by several of these hoodlums. She’s a retired musician in Nanjing, and like many of her neighbors, she just wants to keep her home. And now she’s fighting for her life in the hospital because she suffered head trauma at the hands of these thugs.
My reason for writing is in hopes that one of you (an actual reporter) will read this and go to the 454 Hospital in Nanjing and interview at least a couple of the residents who were beaten today and get their side of the story.
Jeremy Guo
- Posted by Jeremy Guo