Photos of Sydney Olympic Park

Blog entry #2

Globalization is very important to the Olympic Games and to Australia. It has given them a chance to showcase their innovative side. I say this because Sydney’s Olympic Park is one of the first green initiatives. It was with much success. Show-casing on a worldly stage also leaves room for scandals and other negative news reports (like the first torch runner). Much of the waste is recycled, many of the stadiums are still used and not left abandoned like many other Olympic stadiums of the past, and they stopped their original construction when endangered frogs were discovered on the premises. Funding for this project was also important to its success which came from the federal government, private corporations, and the state government. It was amazing how Australian’s utilized these facilities to put on concerts, and other competitions on a world stage (such as tennis tournaments. I also thought that it was an Aboriginal woman lighting the Olympic flame who hadn’t previously won a gold for Australia but would go on to do so in the 2000 games. All of this is reflected in the course and learning materials because it is apparent that Australia was competing on a global stage to host the Olympic Games and to accommodate travelers, teams, and fans. It might mean that the tourism group will focus on large attractions like the games for tourism to be successful. Because, the 2000 games had people from all over the world coming to watch and organizations are aiming to increase tourism by about 8.3% according to CORPORATE PLAN 2010/13.

Blog entry #1

Primarily Australia was utilized in the early spice trade by the European powers. Later they became a colony of Britian. The authors of THE WORLD IS SPIKY are asserting that the world may not be flat as Friedman claims but people who live their lives in cities have more of an advantage than those who don’t because they are much closer to research, industry, and innovation. At Bondi beach many people were from a younger age group around the 20’s but there certainly was a wide range of age. I found that many people from all over the world came to that beach such as Swedish, Asians, and Africans. It also appears that a few younger Australians are a little more rowdy and don’t exactly follow beach policy (alcohol and smoking). I was not surprised that typical stereotypes are commonly wrong. Australian’s are more like normal Americans and Europeans and not rough cut bush-men. The beaches are a great example of globalization 3.0 because it shows that people from all over the world compete and are able to travel wherever they like. People seemed to come to the beach from all around just to enjoy it. And this was without much compliant; there were many people in the surf and not many were worried about the riptide. I have been to one of the worst riptides in the world (Hawaii) and found the Australian beach to be less perilous. Although, members of our group did save a man’s life which proves that danger in the ocean is always apparent.