One Hundred Days to the Athens Olympics

The opening of the 28th Athens Summer Games, scheduled for August 13, is now only one hundred days away.

The upcoming Olympics come with greater significance because it is in Athens, its birthplace, where the first modern Olympic games of 1896 and the ancient Olympics were hosted.

Mr. Kim Sung-chul, Korea Sports Council captain of the 1st International Team personally reports on the Athens atmosphere he sees during his training session at AtHoc:

The fear of the unknown overcame me when I touched down in Athens. Greece is a friendly nation to Korea, but there is only a minimal exchange between the two countries. Also, the unfamiliarity of the language frightened me.

Fortunately, my worries proved groundless. There were lots of sailors with three sides of the country surrounded by sea, and a number of them have visited Korea. I even saw a few who greeted me with Korean words. The people of Greece regard Korea favorably. The country’s participation in the Korean War may have played a part in the friendliness.

I was able to approach them easily as about a half of the population understood English, though it is not their primary language. They say about 70% of high school graduates are able to communicate in English.

Let me get to the main subject of discussion. One cannot easily spot any conspicuous hassle in Athens with only about 100 days left until the Games. In contrast with Korea’s preparation of the Seoul Olympics, where the whole event was turned into a grave national affair, the Greeks seem to be at leisure with the matter. There are still a number of ongoing construction projects with the stadiums and roads. Weekend construction is the biggest change to be seen.

Consequently, the host decided to hold swimming competitions in a roofless pool as the deadline drew closer. The only concern in case of rain is that the Federation Internationale De Natation (FINA) may not accept the results of swimming events as official records, though it may cause little hindrance with the procession of the games.

The focal point of everyone’s interest is on the security issue against possible terror attacks. The United States and Australia decided to have their athletes stay on their cabin cruisers. Additional security measures are to be taken to prevent underwater infiltration. The Greek government advised the U.S. against possession of weapons though it will not interfere with accompaniment of security agents of their own.

Greece drew up a budget of 800 million dollars and plans to put in 50,000 police and military personnel to tackle the security issue. Also, the government is putting much effort in publicizing cooperation from NATO and the EU.

A security conference will be held in Athens starting from May 24. Korea is scheduled to attend. Korea plans to send its own security personnel, but AtHoc wants to have the countries handle the situation with the given number of people that are to attend the games. It causes problems either way since additional security personnel will eventually cause a reduction in the number of athletes, adversely affecting their performances.

The lodging in Athens resembles that of Korea’s back in the 80s. The best of the highest quality hotels stands heads and shoulders above the rest, but a regular five-star hotel in Greece would only be granted three stars in Korea. The lodging has become another problem along with the terror-fright, as getting a room here is next to impossible.

Athens seems rather composed even with all the reports of predictions about a surge of prostitutes. Also, there were worries about unsold tickets because of the unstable international setting, which was proved to be unfounded with a reservation rate of more than 40 percent.

There were concerns about this and that regarding the Athens Olympics, most of which were proved groundless. All that is left for the Korean team of athletes is that they push themselves for the remaining hundred days to have the country ranked among the world’s top ten sporting nations and to win more than 13 gold medals for the first time in Korean history.

Hwan Soo Zang zangpabo@donga.com