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Reporting from Sydney,
Australia, Allen Schauffler - of KING5-TV in Seattle, Washington - explains:
- "credential
envy." 28k
80k
- the
significance of Flack Boulevard in Sydney. 28k
80k
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Reports from Belo Interactive contributors at the Olympics in Sydney, AustraliaSpectacle? It's bigger than that 09/15/2000 By Mark Johnson / KTVB-TV, Boise, Idaho I have covered some of the nation's biggest sporting events over the past 20 years. Superbowls, NCAA basketball and
football National Championships, PGA and US Open championships, the World Series
as well as the Idaho state tennis championship (Okay, so I threw my daughter' s
shining moment into the "mix.") But, I have never been to anything or seen
anything as huge and as mind-bending as the 2000 Sydney Games.
The word
spectacle is a catch phrase heard often by the reporters reporting live shots
back to the states. But it doesn't come close to describing the scene in this
coastal city in southern Australia. There are 17 million people in this country.
Nearly 30-percent of them are in a 20 mile region at this very moment. And
10-percent of that number is around me as I submit this entry! 20,000 media
members are covering 10,000 athletes and even by my math that amounts to 2 press
members for every Ping-Pong player in the games. " ...Excuse me Tai, I need to get
something for my hometown back in the Northwest...could you tell me if you have
ever wondered how the quality of table tennis compares in, say...Weiser, Idaho to
the world class ping- -er, table tennis athletes of the Eastern countries?" I
have actually seen requests for interviews from the equestrian venue...FOR THE
HORSE!
I am eating most of my meals in the NBC commissary...Alongside
legends like Bud Collins (he doesn't wear plaid when he's off the air), hall of
famer Bill Walton, Bob Costas and Hannah Storm. I walk by all of them and
address them by name the way your best friend used to do when he passed you in
hallway in high school." ...Hannah!!!! How did the rehearsal go yesterday???? Hey,
I heard Katie r-e-a-l-l-y struggled with her script in the wind outside
yesterday...Isn't it great to be inside with the prompter??? Ya, me too...Listen,
would love to chat...but Costas is calling me on the cell...catch ya, kid!" "...yo,
Walton!! Gimme 50 and I'll take Namibia tommorrow!!! HA!!! Later dude.!!
I'm just trying to fit in.
Media, fans, and oh ya, athletes...tommorrow the
games begin and I can finally start covering some SPORTS. (I hear the
synchronized hammer-thrower from Belarus can locate Boise on a map!!! He'll be a
great interview!)
"...Tommy!!!! Broker-man!!!, it's me, MJ!!!!...remember
when you suggested we change the carpet in the newsroom...hey, I gotta tell you
about my day..."
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Track star 
1996
swimming gold medalist Ryan Berube 
