These pictures were snapped between August 2 and August 6 and focus mainly on the American Bowl which was held at Sydney's Olympic Stadium.
The stadium is a work of proportional art (which the pictures will hopefully show) and seats around 130,000 (just a few more than good ole' Spartan Stadium). I'm not so sure that there were enough places to get beer and food (are there ever?) so I'm not too sure how the binging Olympic goers will fare. Then again, I guess performance altering drugs are the in thing now, huh?
The other thing that blew my mind is that they ran out of American Bowl souvenirs an hour and a half before kickoff. Each booth only had a few of each thing, but it seemed that every booth had about thirty copies of the PC version of Gameday '99. (Huh????) Anyway, now you know what you'll be getting for Christmas.
Watson's Bay+
Having said all that about Olympic Stadium, let start off with a picture that has nothing to do with it. This shot was taken from my seat in an outdoor beer garden at Watson's Bay, a northeastern neighborhood facing Sydney Harbor. It has a kick ass view of the city, more so with a few in ya. ;)
Olympic Park+
The trip from my flat in Coogee to Olympic Park in Homebush, a western suburb of Sydney, was by bus and train, respectively. This is what I saw once I got off the train - Olympic Park. Funny story - after the game, the lines to get back onto the train were, as one would expect, insanely long. So, you know how people like to 'moo' when they're in big crowds? Well, they don't moo here. No, Australia is a big lamb country, so they 'baa'. So now you've got all these drunk Australians that have no idea what sport they just saw or what the hell happened in it because it was nothing like rugby 'baaing' with their "I'm not British! I'm Australian, mate!" accent. Unreal.
Olympic Stadium+
Our original seats were about thirty rows up from the field on the 15 yard line, and this is what the place looked like once we got situated after buying all those copies of Gameday '99. Notice the shadows? That's the morning sun doing it's thing. The game started at 10:00am Sunday morning here to be televised live Saturday night at home.
Oh Say Can You See...+
If you've never sung the national anthem outside the United States (No, Canada doesn't count. Canada never counts.), I highly recommend it. I don't mean to sound sappy, but I now know exactly how proud it's meant to make us feel. As long as Roseanne isn't singing it, that is.
Halftime did a Bad Bad Thing+
What's a football game without some cheesy halftime entertainment? How about Chris Isaak singing 'Baby Did A Bad Bad Thing' in a purple and gold suit? I felt sorry for him, really. I mean, if you think about it, this is the same guy that had Helena Christensen rolling around on the beach for him a few years ago when he was cool. Jesus, what happened?
Yeah!! He's Punting!+
Attendance at the game was small and about 50/50 American/Australian, the latter having no clue as to what was going on in the game. I think the only time they cheered was when the Chargers' punter came running out every 4th down. He's Australian, and the only Australian in the NFL, which is cool. Unfortunately, cheering for punter's is not cool.