Funny thing about the Olympics. The local citizens are often apathetic and/or cynical about the whole thing in the years and months leading up to them - but once they are underway people enter into the spirit. I was the same in Sydney. I decided more or less at the last minute that I wanted to be part of the experience, and ended up attending a number of events.
Sydney's Olympics were impeccably organised and carried out. People who know Sydney or who live there find that bizarre. In many ways Sydney is quite a dysfunctional city, but for two weeks everything worked, the train system ran 24 hours a day, no trains were late or cancelled; even the weather, which can be unreliable in September, stayed good. It was amazing how. on the Monday after the games ended, everything was back to normal. Grey skies and drizzle, crowded and late trains, cancelled services.
The London Olympics, like the Sydney 2000 ones, have done something that is all too rare - injected a bit of humour and self-deprecation into what is often a pompous event full of its own importance. I was delighted when I learned that Mr Bean made an appearance.