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Even war does not get in the way. Lebanon sends (fittingly) a team of skeet and trapshooters. (On the TV news recently, the shooters complained—seriously—that they were not getting enough practice.) The Irelands unite North and South for a moment to create a single team. Astonishingly, the Koreas considered doing the same. They matter, these Games: to Belgium's cyclists, Argentina's single sculler, Holland's swimmers, the boxers from the Seychelles. India's field hockey team is out to prove something against Pakistan. Kenya's long-distance runners have things to prove to themselves. Cheers for the Chadians. Hail to the Swazis. Where else would these people come together so eagerly? Not the U.N.
Is this the center, then? An international Woodstock? "The Olympic flame is the only hope for brotherhood, understanding and dialogue," says Juan Antonio Samaranch, president of the International Olympic Committee. What else would he say? "The Olympics are the only times in the history of the world when so many nations come together in one spot in an association of friendship," says Charles Palmer, president of the British Olympic Association. Vested interest. According to Kurthan Fisek, a professor of public management from the University of Ankara, "No single institution in the entire history of mankind has been able to equate itself with world peace as effectively and consistently." Let's not get carried away.
Yet not all of this is cant. Michael Jordan of the U.S. team pretends not to see the basket, then lunges toward it, as if stumbling on the court. Suddenly he leaps, glides, hangs in the air. The ball is cradled in the palm of his hand at the side of his head. Still flying, he flicks his wrist forward, as if waving hello, and the ball sets off on a flight of its own. When the hoop is scored, Jordan is airborne still. Why are we pleased?
Heroes must be part of the answer. There are those like Jordan, Mary Decker, Carl Lewis who enter the Olympics with greatness already thrust upon them; one will test their performances against their reputations. Better still, sudden heroes always seem to emerge and establish themselves, often in sports one has dismissed as boring or has paid no attention to before. Olga Korbut and Nadia Comaneci created gymnastics for most Americans, not because Americans never heard of gymnastics, but because they had not seen the sport performed by virtuosos. A subtle surprise of the Olympics is how individuals can transform the events in which they participate. Boxing enrages and disgusts you. Then Sugar Ray Leonard skips into the ring, and the sport is God and country.