Column Eight
A NEWSPAPER report recently described Hongkong as ''solid'' in support of Beijing's bid to host the 2000 Olympics. Not quite. After spending my first 19 years under its slate grey skies, lightened only by best bitter and chips fried in beef dripping, I have earned the right to cheer on the claim of my home city of Manchester.
Normally, hosting the Olympics is not something you would wish on Pyongyang, let alone a town you have feelings for. During the Olympics, critical facilities and schools are suspended as one million people are drafted to rehearse daft dances and giant word forming routines for the opening ceremony.
Animal figures usually reserved for cereal packets take the form of three dimensional fluff mascots and invade shop windows and the back of taxis - which double their charges, as do stores, hotels and tarts. Large foreign women strut the streets with contours under their running shorts that only the crew of the Starship Enterprise should be expected to face. To back up the lies the city fathers told the Olympic Committee, resources have to be diverted leaving the citizens to walk to work and live by candlelight. Let us not forget the Montrealers who still labour in the quarries of debt after their hospitality to the Olympics in the 70s.
But, where Mancunians are concerned, a visitation of Visigoths would be a pleasant diversion compared to years of football supporters on the streets every Saturday afternoon and, as a resident, my old Mum is looking forward to her US$33 share of the US$92 million projected surplus the city expects from the shindig.
A leaked IOC report has compared the six competing cities in terms of ''points for'' and ''points against''. There were points about Manchester that the report overlooked. We know a point against Beijing is that it is the capital of a regime with no noticeable track record in the giving of sporting chances. An unknown point for Manchester, apart from free black puddings for competitors, is that it long ago had its Tiananmen, back in 1811. It was called The Peterloo Massacre. Unarmed demonstrators were charged and killed for protesting against disparities in wealth and falling living standards under a long-running Conservative government.
It may take China, as it has taken Britain, another 182 years to live at peace in a democratic society with disparities in wealth and falling living standards under a long-running Conservative government.
Brasilia deserves further points against for being difficult to find at all, but one in favour for the tendency of Brazilian women to dance and bare their nipples at times of rejoicing or after a gin and tonic. On the other hand, chill winds from the east and marauding Irish from Liverpool ruin Manchester's reputation as a nipple-friendly city.
Unlike Berlin, there is no chance in Manchester of a mass neo-Nazi revival during the marathon final or of the Olympic flame being carried through Turkish quarters. In Istanbul, there is nothing but Turkish quarters and the point that the Turks probably wouldn't let the Germans in whereas Manchester, on reflection, probably would.
In Manchester, immigrant groups are more integrated and confident. Going through their districts, they fire on you. The only mention the China Daily has ever made of Manchester was a sly and Olympically calculated report of a shoot-up in the West Indian ghetto of Moss Side. No Olympic village is planned for Moss Side. The planners can't get close enough.
The only point against Sydney recorded by the IOC is its horse quarantine demands which cuts out The Princess Royal and The Argentinians.
The IOC ''points for'' buzz with ''excellents''. They refer to the 140 ethnic groups that will all help with translations. They won't. They're using their ethnic tongues full-time, driving cabs. The IOC marvels that competitors in 14 sports can walk to their venues. Given Australian transport unions, they'll have to.
A group of aboriginals is currently making a credible claim to the Harbour Bridge which should make minced kanga out of Sydney's points for ''excellent transportation''.
Keating will call off the bid anyway when a certain technicality occurs to him. He wants Elizabeth II removed as Queen in 2001. That is one year after the Games, which are, of course, formally opened and closed by the head of state. Manchester, your glory is at hand! Your Majesty, bring a brolly.