Saturday 28 July 2012

A Different Kind of Olympics

Several of my blogging friends have been telling us about how they experience the Olympics, most notably Jenny, who has the advantages of a) living in London and therefore being right THERE where it is all happening, and b) being a professional travel writer and so being able to convey the atmosphere of a place better than someone who, like me, just writes down what comes to their mind in no particular order. If you have not done so already anyway, I also recommend you read Graham's post about the opening ceremony, and what John thinks about the subject.

My weekly paper, the ZEIT, has been mentioned before on my blog; it is to me a very reliable source of interesting reading material which often leads me from one of their articles to more research on a particular subject, sometimes even buying books because of what I have read there.

Yesterday, I found an article in this week's issue about a different kind of Olympics: The Deutsch-Olympiade (German Olympics).
Have any of your ever heard of it before?

There is, of course, all the information about it on the Goethe Institute's website; they organize the whole thing, after all. And doesn't it sound like a great idea, to bring together young people from all over the world for two weeks and have them work together at a goal that will result in some of them being rewarded extra for their efforts?

100 students aged 14 to 19 can participate. They have to have a certain command of German and are, if I understand correctly, recommended by their teachers. They are then invited to Frankfurt, Germany, where they spend two weeks with all the other students (and one teacher on every two students), taking quizzes in German, writing newspaper articles in German and working out presentations in German, as well as visiting places of interest - and with so many young people in one place, I bet there is some partying and a lot of fun going on as well.

At the end of the two weeks, the four best students out of the 100 (who came from 46 different nations this year - I don't think I can even name that many countries out of the top of my head!) are rewarded with a prize: a four-week stay in Germany, including a language course at a Goethe Institute. 

Remarkably, out of the four medal winners, three are boys - isn't it commonly expected that girls are more linguistically inclined, while boys are more into maths and physics? 

Of course, this all costs a lot of money, paid for by the Goethe Institute. And of course, it is not entirely done out of pure, unselfish love for humankind. Germany has, as a whole, a problem with recruiting experts; there is a lack of well educated young people willing to work hard in many of the industries that constitute the backbone of our economy. Attracting young, well-learned people to Germany is therefore not a bad idea, and could lead to at least some of them eventually deciding to come here for their studies and later on for work. As far as I am concerned, I think the German Olympics are a good thing - although a lot less glamorous, popular and well known as London 2012 :-)

20 comments:

  1. I never ever have seen an Olympic opening ceremony, except what they showed next day in the world-news, since yesterday night! I only wanted to have a short look to the stadium and maybe some of the politicans in the audience, than switching to a criminal film.
    But- it was so gorgeous, terrific, I couldn't leave it, I sat there from 10 pm (german time) to 2 o clock in the morning.
    I have to say: The British made a very good job there, though our German commentators spoke sometimes a bit rubbish...But I liked all the fantastic ideas. The Queen seemed not very amused, I couldn't see her smile anytime.
    By the way: I knitted one whole sock while watching...;-)

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    1. hello, Meike's Mum,

      I thought too much of the whole thing was reflecting the past although I agree that was quite well done. All the rest, apart from the athletes marching in, was pop music. not always very good. The only bit I really liked was the lighting of the flame ceremony.

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    2. Hello Mum,
      wow - you watched the whole thing!!! And I am not surprised that the German commentators were sometimes talking rubbish. It is something they seem to be quite good at ;-)
      Plus you were productive while you were watching - excellent! :-)

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    3. Oh Hi! This is like butting into another conversation. So apologies, but I was also glued to the opening ceremony - except for the 90 minutes when the athletes came in.And was another one who expected to find it boring.

      I loved the music used, and the off beat things like using a deaf and dumb choir to sing the national anthem.

      Also loved the queen looking bored and filing her nails even when the TB team came in....

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    4. Hi Macy, you are very welcome to "butt in" on our conversation :-)

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  2. I think it's an excellent idea. Germany needs to attract enterprising and intelligent young people to remain in the top stratum of industrialised nations. It's a country which still has a future and making sure that this future is lead by young people who themselves have a future is the right way to go about it.

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    1. Thank you, Friko. Yes, I like the idea, too. In the ZEIT article they said that (hardly surprising) many friendships were formed among the young people, and I can very well imagine that some of those friendships will last for a long time, if not for life. If I had been invited to a similar event as a teenager, it would have been a formative and impressive experience, I am sure of that.

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  3. I think it's a wonderful idea! Sort of "athletics for the mind" - which in my opinion we need more of!

    The best part of the opening ceremonies was when the Queen parachuted in! I was less than impressed with some of the "entertainment." I also think it's time for Paul McCartney to hang up his voice . . . my personal preference would have been to have Sir Elton John or Sir Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones or maybe have them all there for an historic number.

    Of course there was the huge debacle over Team USA's outfits (made in China, nothing against the Chinese), which were awful looking. Secondly why was our team wearing French berets, we should have been wearing cowboy hats! It's nice that Ralph Lauren wanted to give the team a "gift" ~ but he should have know better and kept his HUGE logo off the outfits. Finally, Team USA should have paid more attention to details!

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    1. Of course it wasn't really the Queen to parachute in :-) Someone commented on this on someone else's blog, but no, it wasn't really her.

      Ah well, the outfits... I have not seen any of them, but I do sometimes wonder at similar such events who makes the final choice on the matter, and what WERE they thinking!

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  4. I think the Deutscholympiade is a great idea! I wonder what the 47 countries are that were represented. My daughter had a junior year abroad in Munich, and later returned for more time at the university there (and to continue spending time with the wonderful young German who became her husband!). Some of her friendships there have lasted and I think will surely continue to do so.

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    1. Your daughter's story sounds so romantic, Kristi!
      I've just checked the list of winners on the Goethe Institute's website, the first three came from Bosnia, Azerbaidjan and India; there were three winners (2nd prize) from Bulgaria, Russia and Kameroun; three from Slovakia, India and Korea, and the "Fairness Prize" went to a 17-year-old boy from New Zealand.

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    2. Nice that so many continents are represented!

      My husband worked in Munich after his master's degree and before the PhD and later in Stuttgart and that inspired Emily to want to go to Germany, plus we have relatives there.

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  5. I think that this "different" kind of Olympics is a very good idea, indeed!
    And I went to the website you indicated, but it was all in German and I can't read that language! (Is there a button there to make it magically turn into English? Sometimes that is the case, and I don't always see it. I need new glasses!)

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    1. No, Kay, there isn't a button on the site to have it appear in English - the whole purpose of the Goethe Institute is to promote German all over the world, so their purpose would not be well served if they did their websites in English ;-)
      But I am sure if you search for "Deutscholympiade 2012" on the internet, something in English will come up as well.

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  6. My experience of watching the opening ceremony was similar to you mum's (except I did not knit!) The Deutsch-Olympiade sounds like a good idea. I had to go check a book I got long ago, back in 'senior high school' ... It was not from the Goethe institute, but a book about Goethe und seine Zeit, "Überreicht vom Generalkonsulat der Bundesrepublik Deutschland als Prämie für besondere Leistungen in der deutschen Sprache" (1973) Not quite an olympic medal, but still... ;)

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    1. Yes, Monica, I read your post about the opening ceremony :-)
      And you having been given that book is quite impressive - I am sure they did not hand out books left right and centre, but only when a student really was excelling in a certain subject. Have you read it?

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  7. Thanks for the mention of my Olympics post. Like your Mum I'd never seen an opening ceremony (or a closing one for that matter) but was enthralled. The Deutsch-Olympiade is, I think, a wonderful idea and a really positive initiative and your comments on some of the reasons make so much sense. I was very pleased to see that a New Zealand lad got the "Fairness Prize".

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    1. If it had not been for that article in the ZEIT, I'd never heard of the Deutsch-Olympiade. And it makes me wonder how many other really good things are happening out there all the time without us knowing. Only what is deemed "important" by The Media (whoever they really are) makes the big headlines and is in the news on telly.

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  8. I learn something new every day. I miss keeping up with you. Watching the Olympics on small TV on floor.

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    1. So do I, Mark - and more often than not, the newly learnt things come to me through other people's blogs.

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