Have I been Rip Van Winkle?

I went to our clubhouse to watch the opening of the Olympics on a larger screen than I have at home. It was spellbinding and I really appreciated the time spent constructing this magnificence.

However, when the countries marched in...it was like I was on a different planet. Half of the countries I never heard of. Did the ocean open up and form more islands and then they became countries.

Did I flunk geography? Was I sleeping when the countries were formed.

Did they change the names to protect the innocent like in Jack Webber?

I can't figure it out. The folks sitting behind me went to a school in New York and they never heard of them either.

When did all these changes take place? I have an old world globe...these countries don't exist on it.

I used to collect stamps...never heard of them and I had them from all over the world.

I'm old...is it possible that I have forgotten their names. They're not so primitive....they know about the Olympics because they sent representatives.

Some countries only had one. Most of them were black. Was Africa all divided up.

How do they earn a living in these countries....are they a happy people. We know so little about them.

The longer I live ... the more confused I become.

Are our children aware of these names. Do they ever visit the United States....are they friendly.

It's like they're from another planet. Maybe I need to go back to school?

Today we see China promoting the Olympics for grand propaganda purposes, reintroducing itself to the world for what it expects to be its dominant century. But in 1958 China wanted nothing to do with the rest of the world. Mao Zedong's People's Republic withdrew from the Olympics altogether that year in an ideological snit over the refusal of Brundage and his IOC cohorts to ban Taiwan, which called itself the Republic of China and was run by Chiang Kai-shek, Mao's old antagonist. In retreating from the Olympics, China denounced Brundage as "a tool of the imperialistic State Department of the United States."
The context was different, but the central political question as the Rome Olympics neared was the same as it is now: how should the world deal with China? The issue was debated that year by Vice President Richard Nixon and Sen. John F. Kennedy during the presidential campaign, and Brundage and the IOC became embroiled in it as well. The United States did not recognize Mao's mainland government, Mao did not recognize Chiang's island government and the IOC had nothing but trouble with both. Not long after the People's Republic withdrew from the Olympics, the IOC ruled that Taiwan could no longer call itself the Republic of China at the Olympics because it did not represent the geographical entity of China. It could march in the opening ceremony only as Taiwan or the other name for the island, Formosa.
Suddenly Brundage went from being called a tool of American foreign policy to being labeled a communist sympathizer. Right-wing groups in the United States mounted an intense letter-writing campaign denouncing him. The State Department, while claiming to be free from political involvement in the Olympics, began a lobbying effort to persuade the IOC to overturn the decision. The Taiwanese, in diplomatic cables with Washington, went so far as to suggest that perhaps they should introduce Brundage, a known philanderer, to some of the "fleshpots of Rome" to help the cause. When all else failed, the United States urged Taiwan to boycott the Olympics rather than accede to the change in nomenclature, which was taken as a symbolic victory for the Reds in the cold war.

All I ever learned about China was from Pearl Buck and it wasn't very flattering about their girl babies.

Today...half of all the products we buy come from China.