Quotes of the Day

Spyros isn't happy. he's had 40 years of Athens' notorious traffic, but this is beyond a joke. His car is crawling in a line of vehicles that snakes up the main road to the beachside suburb of Vouliagmeni, stymied by a local bus that seems to stop every 50 m. "One hundred fifty-six euros," Spyros says, nodding enviously at the empty outside lane. The five red rings on the shimmering asphalt mark it as reserved for official Olympic transport, and the fine is savage.

"We should block the streets with our cars, lock the doors and walk away," he says. "But for Olympics, everyone must sacrifice."

Three cars, unwilling to cooperate, whistle past so fast and so close together it would make a member of the r.a.a.f.'s Roulettes display team blanch. Two kilometers on they are there again, stopped, the fighter pilots standing on a sparkling carpet of headlight glass. Evidently one of them has slipped momentarily out of formation, and to judge by their gestures and shouting, the consequences have taken everyone by surprise.

Everyone but Spyros. "Greeks," he says, with a smile of pride. "Very bad drivers."

It may not be in their psyche to leave much room for error, but despite the doomsayers, the Athenians delivered the Olympic Games when they said they would, and with some style. The volunteers, visible even in the city's outer suburbs in their bright uniforms, make their way to the venues helping everyone in their path, whether they need it or not. They are as willing and as charming as their counterparts in Sydney were, and the locals, even those who can't afford the high ticket prices, are welcoming.

There is profiteering, of course - a rug seller in the bazaars of Istanbul would be embarrassed to attempt the mark-ups found in some second-rate hotels - but mostly it's the same gentle gouging of tourists that is sport in every city worth visiting.

The Olympic facilities are excellent; even the journalists have been cared for, operating out of a press center more sumptuously appointed than many of the offices they come from. And the staff are helpful and interested: "Where are you from?" asks a strikingly beautiful girl at the accreditation desk.
"Australia."
"Oh, like everyone else."

And so it seems. The accent tumbles out of bars and restaurants; crowds of Aussies with tell-tale stripes of sunblock saunter around the dusty futuristic vastness of the Olympic complex. Everyone here points out that Melbourne's Greek population makes it the third biggest Hellenic city after Athens and Thessaloniki; it seems possible that this week Athens could just pip Brisbane in the Aussie population rankings. Nowhere is more Australian than the aquatic center this first Monday of competition. From the top of the stand the view stretches back across the city, white against the dull brown hills. The sun is low under threatening black clouds furled by a wind that sets the national flags snapping on their poles.

Far below - for these are the cheaper seats - the bright-blue pool is packed with youngsters weaving around each other, diving and springing out like seals, practicing their strokes. It could be any public pool on a warm summer's evening, until you notice first that nobody is bumping into anyone else; and second, that everything is happening at a little over twice normal speed. The giant screens at each end of the pool announce the warm-up session will end in 15 minutes, and it dawns on the ignorant spectator that this is how Olympic swimmers loosen up before a race: not with a couple of lazy stretches, but with a few hundred meters of blindingly fast laps.

By now the Australian invasion is in full flood, streaming through the ticket barriers and swarming into the stands. There are Chinese and Japanese nearby, discreetly waving their flags, but swamping them are green-and-gold boxing kangaroos, Australian flags and banners, and giant hands signaling "No. 1" in Australian colors.

One group is dressed in golden T shirts advertising them as team alice mills. They are here to watch Alice in her 200-m individual medley semi-final. In this same stand a few hours ago, when Alice qualified from the heats, her mother was trembling so much she couldn't operate her mobile phone to call her husband on the other side of the pool. "I had to push the buttons for her," says an Australian spectator. She's here for the big race, the men's 200-m freestyle, but she and her compatriots have adopted Alice for the night. For such an important event, an Olympic final seems rather short on ceremony. The women's semis over, the eight men emerge from a waiting room. As they're introduced, Australian hands rustle in backpacks and bigger banners are produced. The last man, Canadian Rick Say, in Lane 8, waves to the crowd and takes off his track suit. Then they're on the blocks and, as if by telepathy - no chance of hearing the starter above the noise of the crowd - they're porpoising in unison toward their first stroke.

There is something mesmeric about Ian Thorpe's style. Surrounded by the best swimmers in the world, Pieter van den Hoogenband and Michael Phelps among them, his languid crawl seems almost too slow, too casual, for the race. Van den Hoogenband appears to be pulling ahead on each of the first three laps; each time Thorpe turns beautifully and claws back the difference.

On the last lap, the individual cries of encouragement have merged into a deafening roar - with an Australian accent, if that's possible. It's primal, visceral, genuinely thrilling. Everyone is standing now, screaming, concentrating intently on Thorpe, as if trying to transfuse their wills into his.

After an eternity lasting 104.71 seconds, Thorpe's hand touches just ahead of Hoogie's and the thousands of Australians sigh and slump exhausted into their seats. Two rows down, a portly woman is gasping for breath. "It's harder work up here than in the pool," she says. The air is cool now, but her husband is dabbing with his athina 2004 cap at streams of sweat. "My bloody oath," he replies. Strangers are toasting each other with plastic cups of Heineken, tough-looking businessmen with smiles so wide you glimpse the children they once were.

The night has peaked early, but there are other delights for other nations - a silver for Markus Rogan in the 100-m backstroke prompts a delighted Austrian to cry, "First swimming medal for Austria since 1912!" "I'd keep quiet about that if I were you, mate," comes the inevitable Australian riposte.

The second semi of the women's 200-m medley has been run, and Alice's time places her 10th. She's missed out on the final by a quarter of a second. But the next Olympics are only four years away. The papers are already suggesting Beijing won't be ready, but it will be; and so will Alice, and so will everyone in her team. Tonight, as they head for the tavernas of the Plaka, there are thousands of them.

• Steve Waterson
• Inside the Aussie Pool Party