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Page 80 Wynnum High and Intermediate School

Olympic Games Impressions
Four hours after leaving the bright sunshine of Brisbane, the plane
dropped through dirty grey clouds to a bleak Melbourne Airport. The
weather was to remain showery until the day of the Opening Ceremony
when miraculously it cleared and it was to remain so until the day of
the closing ceremony, when light rain added a touch of sadness to this
moving last day of the Games.
No adverse weather conditions could, however, take away any of
the splendour of the decorations in the city. Jostling one another to
catch the eye were flags, streamers, huge murals placed on shop fronts
and statues in various athletic poses bulging with unlikely muscles.
Also jostling one another were the thousands of people.
At Heidelberg, the Australian athletes were housed in several two-
storied brick buildings. My room was in the kitchen, and because it was
the most spacious in the flat and adjoined the laundry I was often
surrounded by various articles of drying clothing. The sight of drying
clothing even now evokes memories of that room.
The Australians ate in Dining Room 10, a long, low hut, where we
were able to partake of magnificent food. It was difficult to choose what
to eat since there was so much food and each dish was so well cooked.
To walk to the dining rooms, a short-cut passed between the Russian
quarters, and many of the Russians in the early morning could be seen
performing a ritual of calisthenics on the park in front of their quarters.
I remember a giant basketbailer lumbering around, dwarfing those
jogging beside him.
An avenue with the flags of the competing nations marked the
entry to the Village and nearby was the shopping centre, thronged with
the curious and inevitable autograph hunters. Servicemen guarding the
main gate, kept people out of the Village, and special passes had to
be sought before entry into the Village could be gained for visitors.
4 Being a hop, step and jumper, I was, of course, interested in the triple
jumpers. Adhemar Ferreira da Silva, a Brazilian, who won the event,
provided a picture of the utmost poise and relaxation, which he must
have gained through hours of training on the running track. Slightly
built, but with tremendously strong thighs, he resembled a rubber ball
as he bounded from the ground. The Russian, Tscherbakov, who has
jumped 54 feet, seemed to hurl himself along the ground with sheer
animal power. I trained with a Frenchman, who although he could not
speak English, soon showed me by body postures, that I had several
defects in my technique. We were joined one morning by the Nigerian,
Engu, and he surprised me by speaking a cultured English.
Nearby, the Russian women shot-putters trained and who, seeing
her, could forget the 16 stone Tamara. Part of her training session
was to do push-ups from the hand stand position. The athlete who drew
the greatest attention was Parry O’Brien, the U.S. shot-putter. To
the tune of whirring cameras, this magnificently muscled athlete, bared
to the waist and clad in white track shorts over long flannel underwear,
would effortlessly glide to the shot putt circle and then with an agonised
yell, hurl a 16 pound steel ball to a distance of 60 feet. No matter
what the time of day, one athlete who seemed to be endlessly circling
the track was Zatopek. The only time I saw him stop was to watch an
extremely beautiful U.S. gymnastic perform some stunts. Several
bystanders regretted that they did not have their cameras.
In the march at the opening ceremony, Australia as host nation
marched last, so that we missed much of what went on before our
arrival. We marched through a long wire-netting tunnel from a nearby
oval to the Main Stadium and the unfortunates unable to find seating in
the Stadium lined this and cheered us on our way. Being fairly tall, I