Youth Olympic Games, now on.
Now on, big yawn.
So the young athletes are scattered all over campus, and the local kiddies can meet them and get little pins from them. I did see a few athletes about 13 years old, but most of them look at least 16 to me – hard to see why they get their own Olympics when they can also compete in the big ones. Anyway, the campus here is on lockdown; you can’t go much of anywhere without a security pass. The new metal fences keeping bad guys out (and young athletes in) are about 10 feet tall, supplemented with security cameras and guards at all entry points. My colleague says it looks like Jurassic Park, and she’s right.
The actual competition takes place elsewhere in Singapore; NTU is just the training village. I asked a cab driver yesterday what he thought of the YOG, and boy, did I touch a nerve. “Complete waste of money! Nobody’s going to watch these silly YOGs. You wait, in 5-6 years the Youth Olympic Games will be forgotten. Over budget, and nobody’s watching!”
Well, I suggested that the big Olympics are also a money-loser for the hosting countries. “No, that’s different; real Olympics, world cup soccer finals, people will watch those. This, hah! The government made a big mistake on this one. So many people disagree with it. You wait – in the election the PAP will lose! They will pay for their big mistake when voters go to the polls! They may lose one, even two ministers!”
As you may know, the PAP is Singapore’s only political party. So I asked if it would make a difference, if a couple of ministers had to resign – wouldn’t the PAP just replace them with more PAP guys?
“Ah, but they will know the people are angry! We will voice our objection!”
How angry? How many people will vote against the PAP?
“Very many! Maybe 20%!”
Geez, that’s tough, when your support goes from 98 down to 78%.