Olympics! Let's go! China!

Wonderful piece on the BBC website about some Chinese ministry having dreamed up an approved way of cheering on the Chinese athletes in the Beijing Olympics.

Officials are now being sent around the country to teach the approved cheer to schoolchildren. Apparently it is a combination of waving one’s arms about, clapping, and chanting “Olympics! Let’s go! China!” in a pre-approved rhythm.
A spokesman said that the official cheer was “in accordance with international principles on cheering”. Bet you didn’t know there were any of those.

The Iron Buddha couldn’t quite see the funny side. She insisted that we must have all this sort of thing too. Football chants, for example. Surely the Kop or the Stretford End couldn’t all sing the same song at the same time unless someone had sat them down and taught them?

I had to explain, making the point that I wasn’t saying that the Olympics would make her country look like a complete bunch of bastards (we all know that anyway, but can put it out of our minds if we so wish) but that it would make the most populous country on earth look like one enormous collective horse’s arse. And that we won’t forget.