August 26, 2008


the legacy of Athens

Fresh off the splendor of the Beijing Olympics it’s heartening disheartening [editor's note: sorry about that, posted before my first cup of coffee] to see the legacy of Athens’ Olympic games.

Four years since the Athens Games, a Greek tragedy is taking place. Incredibly, many of the 22 Olympic venues now lie abandoned, as a sad and litter-strewn reminder of sport’s greatest festival.

Gypsy camps have sprung up in the shadow of stadiums where the world’s finest athletes once battled for gold. Graffiti is scrawled over the outer walls of many sites, and it has been reported in Greece that upward of $1 billion has been spent simply to maintain these ugly wrecks.

The Games will never return there. They will not be allowed to, if for no other reason than that the level of public outrage at the grotesque waste of money on oversized venues with no future is extreme.

posted by Deron Bauman in cities, international, sports 

comments

4 Responses to “the legacy of Athens”

  1. alek on August 26th, 2008 at 9:38 am

    that about sums it up, but at least Athens got an infrastructure and a much needed underground that has reduced the pollution levels in the summer considerably. i think the graffitti in Athens is a tradition long as i’ve lived there, since 1976 and it is phenomenal for sure and the gypsies, well me personally, i grew up with them and they slip in just fine, lets not make things too damn slick - eh

  2. alek on August 26th, 2008 at 9:41 am

    oh and besides, they were accolading Athens in the foreign press after the olympics there saying how right they’d got it against all odds, actually the whole olympic venue is making me sick its so cynical

  3. Kris on August 26th, 2008 at 4:43 pm

    The Limpicks should be runnin’, jumpin’, rasslin’ and chuckin’ stuff. Like the “olden days”TM.

  4. Mike Dresser on August 27th, 2008 at 6:02 am

    And nekkid?

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