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NBC Sports.com story: IOC chief says give India a chance
Associated Press
LONDON - India's potential for hosting future Olympics should not be written off before giving embattled New Delhi organizers a chance to pull off the Commonwealth Games with a "last-ditch" effort, IOC president Jacques Rogge said in an interview Friday.
Rogge told The Associated Press that he hopes India can come through, just as Greek organizers overcame "doomsday scenarios" to stage the successful 2004 Athens Olympics despite severe construction delays and political wrangling.
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Hey, where's the hard hat, safety glasses and steel toed boots on that guy?
Swear to God, that was my first impression also! A construction worker wearing sandals doesn't seem like much of a professional. The idea of buildings collapsing doesn't seem too unrealistic.
Marc
You bring up such a valid point. On my travels these days in southern India, I have seen hardhats at workplaces, but usually the workers are lucky to have anything on their feet. Since there is no suing to do for injuries and it is the difference between having and not having a job, they work under unsafe conditions. It is not that the contractors are underpaid on these projects, they just do not see the need for workplace safety. I have seen young mothers nursing their little ones in the construction sites and then leaving them under the shade of a tree and going back to work. They are not crack addicts and irresponsible parents, these are the harsh realities they have to live in for that 'better day'.
The Indian government and organizers have claimed that other countries have overreacted and that the lack of cleanliness claims are due to cultural differences. So the Indians have basically admitted that they and their culture are a dirty people and they don't mind being dirty and unsanitary. That's nice.
The Indians are soooooo far behind china in terms of development and modernism. Looking at the picture above is all you need to see that. A photo of a Chinese construction worker would look much different. It would look appropriate.
tornadoes28
India is a big country with a vast history. Each part is different from the next- it is indeed mind boggling and fascinating whichever way you want to look at it. The lack of hygiene has to do with a lack of education in the masses and unfortunately it is a harsh reality depending on which strata of society a person is from. That does not justify calling an entire group by the epithets chosen by you. I had a colleague, a really nice Italian gentlemen who assumed I was raised in the U.S. because he could talk to me and I was different from his stereotype. It is a question of how much exposure you have. I was so fortunate to live in New York City very many years and was able to fall in love with America in a heartbeat. I found New Yorkers so well informed and well read and assumed the rest of America was so. You are making the assumption, I feel by allowing the commentary of one politician lead you in your judgements.
With regard to China, I have friends who have travelled there extensively and say their villages are no different than the Indian villages in terms of the sad poverty!
Read my post. I did not use any epithets. Tell me what epithet I used. It was in the LA Times and other News sources that Indian officials stated that Western countries had a different cultural belief regarding cleanliness and sanitary conditions. Use some logic and that will tell you that the Indians are stating they have a higher tolerance for unsanitary conditions. Please, once again, where did I use an epithet.
Imagine having to clean up all that cow sh*t everywhere. Watch your step!
China spend something like $45 billion during the Olympics. It is easy to do so when you are not accountable to the people. A Democratic India requires prudent spending (even though a lot would be lining pockets of politicians).
In a Democratic India, the money generated in urban areas gets spent in rural areas. Why, because rural population is large and vote for politicians who spend money there. So urban infrastructure suffers and gives India a bad name. China has no such accountability, the government spends where they like, there is no legal protection on your property or judicial rights. But, China sure looks much prettier than India.
We are talking about a country where you don't buy electricity, but instead, tie a bare copper wire to a Coke bottle and throw it over the nearest high power line. India may have it's intellectual elites, and Microsoft call centers, but the vast majority of the people would make a poor illegal alien crossing from Mexico look like a middle class American in comparison.
True Kent, there are middle class people (something like 300 million), lower middle class (400 million) and something like 400 million in abject poverty. There is no escaping this abject poverty, it is in your face all the time in India. Since India is a Democracy, people freely move whereever they want, so they pile into cities looking for opportunities. It is messy, dirty but stil fair. This is not the case in China.
Anyway, the middle class ignores the poor class, it is like 2 Seperate Countries living side-by-side and their lives hardly intresect.
Which is why a lot of Indians feel this money could have been better spent on other essential items on their 'To Do' list than the indulgence of the games.
Of all the Rich people, in all the countries - only the Indian Rich are known to be the most 'un - giving' to the poverty stricken in their own country...FACT.
Where did you pull that one from?
Hype and Hoopla about India is just that-country has immense poverty, a dysfunctional everything , add rampant corruption, no accountability-it is not surprising you have disaster on hand
It seems better to reserve judgment until after the games. To criticize an entire industry, much less an entire country, on the basis of one picture is a bit short sighted. Other countries who fight chronic and debilitating poverty have hosted games that have been a credit to them and their people. It is certainly one way to spotlight the oft ignored needs of people in the far corners of the world. I say, give them a chance to shine and an opportunity to inject some money into the local economy.
I have never understood why India continues to be in 2010 such a dirty filthy place, You can't blame the over population or the poverty since China has huge populations and poverty and yet it is a modernized and clean society. In all my trips to India I was astounded why Indians continue to live like this and accept this. Apparently most Indians are so use to this that it doesn't bother them anymore. Even the NRI's visit there and don't mind it. India will never be a world power unless they fix it's infrastructure.
China uses the Hukou system to prevent poor people from moving to the Cities. The cities are meant as showcases of Chinese economy, while sweeping the dust under the carpet. In India, freedom of movement is a fundamental right of all citizens. So the poor move to cities in droves, looking for opportunity, build huts on sidewalks, take a dump anywhere and basically make cities dirty and filthy.
As an American Citizen, I vehemently prefer freedom of movment, even if it means dirty, filthy cities as opposed to limited rights. But, yes, Chinese cities sure are pretty. btw, I am not bitter, just stating facts the way they are.
If you really want to see what is going on there read papers from places that will be part of the games. Go look at Canadian, British, and Australian papers and web sites, you will be soon see that it is about far more than what this one picture shows. They have to collapses with-in this month, a bridge, and the ceiling in on of the buildings. The village looks worse that a pig sty, I have seen cleaner a bed mattress in the dump, than the new ones they showed there. It is truely sad, when you see where they are as of last week, and the games next week, not to mention the money spent, yet poor people all around.
In the end ....People will have found the calamities leading up to the games more entertaining than the games themselves.
In the end ....People will have found the calamities leading up to the games more entertaining than the games themselves.
Corrupt government officials are to be blamed for this big fiasco. The ordinary citizens of India, as it appears to me on this postings, are being blamed for the failure of their government.
Four years ago the government took charge of the games when they should have just sidelined themselves. Private enterprise like Reliance was ready to assume complete responsibility at $ 10 billion but were not given the chance.