Sydney Olympics
A triumph of the piss-take

In the 90s, Sydney competed with Beijing for the right to hold the first Olympics of the new mellenium. Not many people gave Sydney much of a chance of winning. Afterall, it only had 200 years of history, and this history was built on the dregs of English society. On the other hand, China had 5,000 years of history and culture, and Beijing was the symbolic representation of it. To everyone one's surprise, Australia defeated its eastern hemisphere neighbour.

From the moment the decision was made, doubts emerged about whether it was the right choice as Australian egalitarian values and cynical thinking resulted in strong criticism of the Olympic movement. It seemed that no day passed without another newspaper highlighting the backroom deals driven by commercial profit motives. Furthermore, Aborigines vowed to use the presence of the world media to embarrass Australia, Bondi residents led protests against a volley ball stadium being built on their beach and a myriad of minority groups argued for a place in the opening ceremony to push their political agenda. Finally, a series of political groups bickered over whether the games should be opened by the Queen, the Prime Minister or the Governor General.

The event was heading towards an abysmal flop until an assortment of larrikins saved the day with cynical piss taking. On the back of their humour, they transformed Australia criticism from a negative whine and into a feel good joke. On a wave of positivism, the Olympics were subsequently labelled the "best ever games."

The beginnings of piss-taking occurred in the opening ceremony. From the moment horse back riders bounded into the arena wearing tight moleskins trousers, people who dismiss the bushmen's claim to the title of "true Australian", began commenting that the lack of such bushmen today proves Darwin's theory of survival of the fittest. They made the perceptive observation that tight moleskins correlate with low sperm counts hence explaining why the bushman is yesterday's hero. Next, viewers were treated to a desert wildflowers parade titled - "peas in a pod". The performance evoked feel-good sentiments as it had many-a man thinking female genitalia as the flowers bore a striking resemblance to little men in canoes.

The history component of the ceremony was a little unusual. There was plenty of stuff about Aborigines, and immigration from non-white backgrounds, but nothing about the 50 years of Convict transportation at Sydney's foundations. Instead, the English were portrayed as a couple of suits that arrived on bicycles. After meeting the Aborigines, the civilised suits evolved into Sunday Joes mowing the lawn. Although the whole thing didn't make any sense, it did look funny to see 1,000 people in Australian attire pretending to cut the grass.

Later, a "confused" Governor General pronounced Sydney "Sa-sa-Sydney", knocked over the microphone and caused an embarrassed John Howard to cringe that the world might think Australia was being led by a socially inept buffoon. Taking it in their stride, many Australians were unconcerned and instead speculated that if Governor General was fired for being "confused" on the job, he obviously had talents as a rap singer to fall back on.

Roy and H.G commentating on gymnastics

As jokes were continually used to address the limitations and stuff ups of the opening ceremony, Sydney created a very vibrant atmosphere. With piss-taking on everyone's lips, a larrikin show titled " the dream", hosted by Roy and HG, struck a chord with prevailing community sentiment; ensuring that Australians went to sleep with a smile on their face. However for the Olympic's marketing arm, the dream was a nightmare. The dream had their own mascot; the lewd and rude Fatso the Fat arsed wombat; aka the battlers prince. Fatso was the kind of mascot that Australians love but would never be approved by officialdom. His pose was that of a perpetual moon and comic animations depicted him waddling across the TV screen leaving little nuggets as a reminder of his grace.

Fatso caused a frenzied sensation; joining Gold Medallists like Michael Klim, Susie O'Neil and Grant Hackett on the winners' dais. So popular in fact, he undermined attempts to sell the the official, and very generic, Olympic mascots, Millie, Ollie and Syd. As Fatso's star rose, the IOC attempted to cut him down by banning athletes appearing with him. Public opinion, flamed by the outraged Roy and HG, later forced the IOC to retreat in embarrassment.

As well as undermining the marketing campaign of the IOC, Fatso undermined that of the Australian Organising Committee. The AOC's $15 million campaign was geared towards the famous Boxing Kangaroo which they had bought from former Australian of the year, Alan Bond. But against Fatso, the Kangaroo appeared well past its prime and was quickly dealt a knock out blow.

Despite calls to mass-produce the battlers prince, ROY and HG refused to cheapen his legacy with any kind of crude commercialisation. The one and only fat arsed wombat was later sold at auction for $80,000 with the proceeds given to charity.

The dream also undermined Australian sports commentators who had been taking too many marketing lessons in America. American sports commentators often use linguistic word plays to make things sound more exciting. For example, in team sports they often use "offence" in the same sentence as "defence" to enhance the feeling of war. They also make up silly names like "Super Bowl" to give events a greater sense of magnitude. When Australian sports commentators tried to do likewise by labelling a day "Super Tuesday", Roy and HG were not fooled. They responded in classical larrikin fashion by naming subsequent days " Wonderful wonderful Wednesday" and " Throbbing Thursday".

Sports also came in for special ridicule. One target of amusement was the Greco-Roman wrestling which Roy and HG showed in the "going the dog" position accompanied by Barry White music. This was followed up with underwater shots at the water polo with graphic footage of"grabbing the flute".

Not even the fans were spared from the piss-take. At the end of the show, the dream allowed sincere sports fans to sing songs they had written and performed about the Olympics. Of particular merit was an old guy singing "we have the facilities and the abilities and the administrative skills" which sounded suspiciously like a communist propaganda song. Another fella sang "protect the earth, with all your worth, exercise damage control" which smacked of the kind of spaced out cult leader that one may expect to find in the American mid-west.

As the dream swept through the city, Australians reaffirmed their distaste for bragging and posturing. Instead, they developed a sense of pride in their uniqueness in a world community. Obviously they wanted to see Australians win gold, but equally, they wanted to see people just getting out and having a go.

The Sydney mood was typified in the way they responded to Eric the Eel, an African swimmer with no more ability than those watching. Eric struggled to swim 50 meters but every stroke was accompanied by the kind of cheer normally reserved for gold medallists. (He was later given a shark-skin swimsuit to shave a few milliseconds off his time that was about 60 seconds off the pace.)

But while the mood led to the likes of Eric the Eel being celebrated, it made many of the over the top American athletes seem sadly out of place. The American athletes stood for everything that Roy and HG were mocking. When they failed to adapt, they found themselves public enemy number one. Those who came in for particular criticism were the American 4 X 100 meter relay team. After winning gold, they struck a series of pre-orchestrated poses, draped in the American flag. Soundly booed by the Australian audience, and later by their fellow athletes, the sprinters subsequently uttered an apology for their offensive behaviour.

It was a new world order. A world in which a fat arsed wombat and a useless swimmer could become icons, while elite flag wavers were relegated to second-class citizen status. The success of the games was made that much more stark in comparison to the games that preceded it, and followed it. The Atlanta Olympics in America had been criticised as overly commercial, jingoistic and badly organised. The Athens Olympics had been criticised for being ignored by the hosts. It seems rather than support the games, the Greeks went on holiday.

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