thanks for the news

Thanks for the news!

thanks for the news!

We changed to a news channel the other night just as they were showing the guy pulling the name out of the envelope... and cheered when we saw and heard it was Tokyo. That was an exciting moment :D

As I did some research in high about the 1964 games, here are some cool facts about the 2020 Olympic Games.

• The four expected Olympic Games (Sochi 2014, Rio de Janeiro 2016, Seoul 2018, Tokyo 2020) are all being hosted by nations in current upheaval, be it politics, financial crises, or military operations. Sochi remains shrouded in mystery, corruption, and radical politics; Rio de Janeiro has mainly fought with police force to clean up drug cartels and the slums outlying the largest city in Brazil; and Seoul is still embittered with North Korean threats. Despite current tensions with the Chinese navy and a charged political climate regarding the Article 9 Clause, only Tokyo is being consistently credited with strictly positive action in the form of intensified cleanup from the 2011 earthquake/tsunami.
• Tokyo was awarded the Olympics in the wake of controversy in Madrid and Istanbul, the two cities that ultimately lost the bid. First, both countries were caught in doping scandals with nearly three dozen athletes on the Spanish Olympic team charged with using physical enhancements. Second, Turkey is currently seen as a minor police state by the international community following a crackdown from President Abdullah Gül in the wake of the Arab Spring. This left journalists and protestors within the unitarian parliamentary country in serious jeopardy, with reports coming in describing shakedowns and arrests with no logic behind the actions. Finally, if not for Greece and Italy, Spain would be the face of European financial ruin. For five years, the economy of Spain has suffered from the EU's economic status, a freefall building/housing market, and a 29% unemployment rate.
• When Tokyo hosted the 1964 Olympics, it was the first time Asia hosted. However, it would also mark the first time an Axis nation hosted the game post-WWII. From the boon that was the '64 Games came intense development in Japan and the Olympics in general. The first electronic stopwatches used; the first Olympics broadcast on television; the era of gymnast Larisa Latynina (18 medals, then a world record) and the final match of wrestler Osamu Watanabe (the only undefeated Olympian at 189-0); the first international exhibition of the taiko drum; the first inclusion of judo held at the newly built Nippon Budokan; the first Fair Play Trophy (then called the Tokyo Award), which demonstrates intense sportsmanship, awarded to Swedish yachtsmen team The Käll Brothers (they surrendered the race to save the lives of two opponents); and finally the lighting of the Olympic torch by Yoshinori Sakai born in Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, the day of the first atomic bomb, which was meant to symbolize the rebirth of a country following a utterly destructive defeat in war.
• Finally, the topic of the 1964 and 2020 Olympics held in Tokyo has come up in anime before. The 1964 anime showed up most recently in Goro Miyazaki's From Up On Poppy Hill as a subplot meant to symbolize hope in a time of intense trial. It also appeared in the 2010 series Showa Monogatari. As for the 2020 Olympics, their mention existed long before this Olympic bid. In fact, this certain work is so influential, it led to the creation of anime's identity in the late 80's. Many Western audiences in the first wave of anime say this was the first anime they ever saw. It is consistently called one of the greatest animated films of all time. The work in question? The 1988 dystopian cyberpunk film Akira. Let's hope life doesn't imitate art.