I’m back, as you know. But that is for another post on another day!

The predictions for Olympics on our papers seems to be holding true: You guys have most medals, but China has most gold. They do seem to be putting their all into this event, and so far the worst complaint is that the kid who appeared to sing some song at the opening was not the actual kid that sang the song. Righteous-wrath-inducing, in terms of fairness, but methinks that telling kids that it shouldn’t be like that would be pure hypocrisy.

The thing about wars is that no matter the outcome, there is a lot of pain and bloodshed involved, even if the end would justify it. The strange thing is, it has been pointed out that what Iraq does to their womenfolk (and Saudi Arabia, which I will return to later) is not supported by the Quran. (Since we are technically a Muslim country, we get more of that.) It was only bosoms that had to be covered, and their Prophet’s wife was a merchant. Probably the whole twisting of doctrines at work again?

On Saudi Arabia: There was this piece in the papers today, in the section with interesting stuff from around the world. It stated that in Saudi Arabia, there is no minimum age for marriage, meaning that parents could “marry” their daughter off at age 1, to be consummated when she’s in her teens. It also mentioned a wedding between an 11 year old boy and a 10 year old girl, which seems to be common as well.
Poor kids.

I guess there’s something about people that makes them hate any kind of war, whether good or bad. Also, it’s pretty understandable that countries don’t like American interference… I wouldn’t want Russia invading us just to “set things right.” However, in cases of tyranny (like Iraq) where the women are treated like less-than-humans and the culture is seeped in anti-Western doctrine, it’s necessary. Of course, I’m a little biased, being American. But anyway…

But anyway, even if it did… I leach. They won’t get any funding from me. Every time I upgrade, I use their bandwidth. It’s the same with Ubuntu: sending me CD’s and letting me download copy after copy costs them… not me. It’s an evil strategy! :#

I don’t think we’ve won anything, badminton women’s doubles having lost to Korea and Men’s Archery losing to Italy (Yes, I have been following the games).

I don’t think your country is scum, possibly aided by the twin facts that a) I have been there and b) I want to go there to study. And well, with governments, I believe that ALL governments have people saying that they suck, whether they actually do suck or not.

What is the deal with protecting other countries though? The logic evades me since we don’t hear much about Iraq that isn’t twisted and Vietnam was too long ago. (The atom bombs on Japan did stop them from killing us all =x)

What about over there? Since you’re closer physically to the games than I am, has it hit M’asia harder? I’m not sure of the standings… has your country won anything yet? I think we won — er — something.

Was there much excitement over the Beijing Olymics opening ceremony over there? Our newspaper reports that for restaurants and hawker food centers without TVs, there were hardly any customers last night.

It would be neat to be named after a TV character. Assuming, of course, that it is a powerful character. And assuming that it’s a good guy and not the villain.