Getting immersed in Olympic frenzies
Maswood Alam Khan | Friday, 8 August 2008
The number 8 is associated with prosperity and confidence in Chinese culture. China perhaps would not have agreed to host Olympics in any other year that would not bear the digit 8 as a qualifying index and I guess China might have been planning to bet or spend any fortune at her disposal to host Olympics or for that matter any other prestigious international event to be held exactly after six thousand years -- in the year 8008.
2008 Summer Olympics opening ceremony, therefore, is due to begin in the Beijing National Stadium precisely at 8:08 PM (China Standard Time) on August 08, 2008 and more than 80 state leaders and royals are expected to attend the opening ceremony. I don't know exactly how many of the current 205 National Olympic Committees (NOC) will ultimately participate in this grand event. But I am sure numerologists in China are keeping their fingers crossed in an expectation that the number would be 202, a lucky figure to augur well from the numerological point of view as the number 202, as summation of its three digits, equates 4 that can wholly divide the lucky number 8.
Most NOCs participate regularly, although various circumstances could cause a nation to be absent from the games, as was the case for six NOCs at the 2006 Winter Olympics.
A man who never in his life played a game or found it a wastage of time to watch a game may wonder why millions of people are so crazy about test cricket, world cup football or Olympic games; himself an avid plant lover he may wish how pleasant life would be if people instead of splurging money on games would spend their funds for gardening.
In a similar vein a game lover would pity the plant lover wondering how a man could be such a duffer to waste away his whole life watering plants only, never ever savouring the intoxicating flavour of games either as a player or as a watcher!
The plant lover and the game lover look at each other as mad caps --two diametrically reverse views which may sound mutually exclusive to a person who is neither a plant lover nor a game lover.
How popular are sports today? Well, in America alone there are 265 television stations devoted primarily to sports talks. Surveys show that 60% of literate people all over the world get a daily infusion of sports statistics and highlights from such media as television, newspapers, books, magazines, radio, blackberry devices and cell phones.
In today's fast-paced world where it is sometimes hard to keep up with things, sports offer well-defined boundaries: your team, my team, a set of rules and people to enforce them. When we play sports or when we get caught up in the action as a fan, we are taken outside of ourselves to concentrate our full attention on something that holds our complete focus and interest.
One day an illiterate friend of Albert Einstein rushed to his house to ask: "Albert, there is a rumor in the town that you invented something called "Relativity"! What is that stuff like?" Concerned about how to make his unlettered friend understand the complex equation of the 'theory of relativity' Einstein groped for an easy answer understandable to his ignorant and gullible friend and finally replied: "If you put your head near a burning oven for two minutes, it would seem you have spent two hours; but, if you hobnob with a cute lady for two hours, it would seem you have spent only two minutes. That is RELATIVITY."
Indeed time flies by when you are engrossed in a conversation with your fianc
2008 Summer Olympics opening ceremony, therefore, is due to begin in the Beijing National Stadium precisely at 8:08 PM (China Standard Time) on August 08, 2008 and more than 80 state leaders and royals are expected to attend the opening ceremony. I don't know exactly how many of the current 205 National Olympic Committees (NOC) will ultimately participate in this grand event. But I am sure numerologists in China are keeping their fingers crossed in an expectation that the number would be 202, a lucky figure to augur well from the numerological point of view as the number 202, as summation of its three digits, equates 4 that can wholly divide the lucky number 8.
Most NOCs participate regularly, although various circumstances could cause a nation to be absent from the games, as was the case for six NOCs at the 2006 Winter Olympics.
A man who never in his life played a game or found it a wastage of time to watch a game may wonder why millions of people are so crazy about test cricket, world cup football or Olympic games; himself an avid plant lover he may wish how pleasant life would be if people instead of splurging money on games would spend their funds for gardening.
In a similar vein a game lover would pity the plant lover wondering how a man could be such a duffer to waste away his whole life watering plants only, never ever savouring the intoxicating flavour of games either as a player or as a watcher!
The plant lover and the game lover look at each other as mad caps --two diametrically reverse views which may sound mutually exclusive to a person who is neither a plant lover nor a game lover.
How popular are sports today? Well, in America alone there are 265 television stations devoted primarily to sports talks. Surveys show that 60% of literate people all over the world get a daily infusion of sports statistics and highlights from such media as television, newspapers, books, magazines, radio, blackberry devices and cell phones.
In today's fast-paced world where it is sometimes hard to keep up with things, sports offer well-defined boundaries: your team, my team, a set of rules and people to enforce them. When we play sports or when we get caught up in the action as a fan, we are taken outside of ourselves to concentrate our full attention on something that holds our complete focus and interest.
One day an illiterate friend of Albert Einstein rushed to his house to ask: "Albert, there is a rumor in the town that you invented something called "Relativity"! What is that stuff like?" Concerned about how to make his unlettered friend understand the complex equation of the 'theory of relativity' Einstein groped for an easy answer understandable to his ignorant and gullible friend and finally replied: "If you put your head near a burning oven for two minutes, it would seem you have spent two hours; but, if you hobnob with a cute lady for two hours, it would seem you have spent only two minutes. That is RELATIVITY."
Indeed time flies by when you are engrossed in a conversation with your fianc