Moscow Talking About Sochi Olympics

Sochi is the focus of the world media now. Wonder how the Games have influenced our life here in Moscow? Here is an insiders view. Sochi Olympics ARE the talk of the town!

 Miscellaneous observations so far:

• Media coverage started with anecdotes about unfinished construction and weird stuff in hotel rooms. I bet that 2 weeks before the start of the Sochi Olympics – about 20-30% of things were not completed yet. Procrastination does exist in our character, so there were a lot of things done last minute. However it seems like all such minor flaws were corrected in couple of days

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  Olympic Hotels (Roza Hutor)

  Olympic area of Sochi does look good. The nature there is gorgeous no doubt, but the stadiums and hotels also do look very modern. There are rumors that hotel rooms are loaded with spy equipment and all conversations are followed. May be…

• I wonder whether the government will be able to monetize the infrastructure after the event. Sochi was historically VERY expensive, I thought about going there for a long skiing weekend in 2008, but skiing in Switzerland was less expensive…

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  Opening Ceremony Sochi Olympics

  Opening ceremony was Grand; we watched and loved it. One moment that I noticed – in a beginning there was a big Russian flag, assembled from people with red, blue and white lights. They entered the arena in a chaotic mode and then gathered in rows. And one red dot moved to a wrong spot and started to panic and ran back and forth to find her place. He or she must have been near heart attack! One moment that everybody noticed – the flop with the rings. That moment however was shown to Russian audience just for a second and swiftly replaced with video from a trial run, during which all rings did open

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  Olympic Flame in Sochi

  For days before Sochi Olympics the most popular joke was -“Alina Kabaeva will ignite the Olympic flame. And what have YOU done for your girlfriend?” (she is rumored to be Putin’s girlfriend or maybe even his wife by now). So we were not surprised to see here in the ceremony. But we liked that she was not the one who actually ignited the fire

• We expect some really big and nice surprise at the closing ceremony. We know that they will try to do something equal or better than the most touching moment of Olympics 80′, when Misha was flying in the sky

• Coverage of the Games is outstanding! First time there is online broadcasting of all sports, which is really cool since you can watch any sports any time you like. Also – great work of TV operators and commentators and cool stuff such as cameras, installed inside hockey gates

• Russian fans are very enthusiastic, good thing that strong alcohol is banned from the Olympic venues. Btw, even in Salt Lake City for Olympics alcohol was temporarily allowed. But in Sochi fans seem to be on high just from sports and no additional doping is needed

• People talk about Sochi Olympics a lot – it is the main topic of any conversation! Russians are very patriotic and really care about medals. And really upset, when we do not get gold. Talked with my mom couple of days ago – she was very upset about a sub-par performance of the Russian biathlon team. She said – I can understand if our team is not good in new or exotic sports. But cross-country skiing?! As if they do not have enough snow in Russia to train well??? Also, my mom watched curling – all of it! And now she respects that sport so much, she says that “curling is chess on ice”

• Regarding the medals though – Russia did propel from the 8^th place to the 3^rd place on Saturday and is now at the 5^th place. To us – that is no wonder. We have a saying: “Russians are slow starters, but they drive fast”

• Hockey games were most anticipated. The entire country was following Saturday’s Russia-US game. Prevailing opinion – not counting that third goal was not fair!!!

• I watched all downhill skiing competitions and think that the slopes were extremely difficult even for the Olympics. Btw, Russians have a lot of empathy – if sportsmen fall – we are very upset and wish them well even if they are not from our team. A lot of my friends were discussing the bad fall of Yuki Tsubota and were very happy that she is more or less ok. And now we are very upset with a severe trauma of Maria Komissarova and hope that she will fully recover

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  Julia Lipnitskaya – New Star of Russian Figure Skating!

  The entire country is super proud of our new figure skating star – Yulia Lipnitskaya, who is 15. She will be the star of this sport for a long time! And of course we are proud for Volosozhar/Trankov and other sportsmen, who brought medals. Plyuschenko story has divided the nation – half of the people think he did his best and is a hero, the other half thinks one has to retire on time and give way to the younger sportsmen. Still not sure what really happened and whether they tried to change horses last minute but really could not find Maxim Kovtun or that is just a play…

• We like that Korean sportsman Viktor An, who is now Russian, brought us medals. And in general, we love when foreigners want to get Russian citizenship

• Lousy job with souvenirs, at least in the capital – fridge magnets or key chains are hard to find in Moscow. There is some souvenir stuff in large chain grocery stores, but no small items – mostly stuffed toys of Olympic mascots, T-shirts and hoodies. I think that’s because stores had to buy licenses to sell Olympic souvenirs, and it was expensive

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  U.S. Olympic Skier Gus Kenworthy is planning to adopt a dog and her 4 puppies

  We loved the cute stories about US sportsmen, adopting street dogs in Sochi! Those photos did melt our hearts!

Please share what you think. Any questions or comments? I would love to hear about the coverage of Sochi Olympics in your country!