Schooled (sort of)

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OK. Apparently, that wasn’t the Last Supper at the opening ceremony.

Except also, it clearly was:

The Paris 2024 organisers have apologised to Catholics and other Christian groups angered after a parody of Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous The Last Supper painting during the Olympics opening ceremony on Friday night.
A kitsch tableau parodied the iconic painting, recreating the biblical scene of Jesus Christ and his apostles sharing a last meal before crucifixion.

See?

However, this facebook post tells us (while dripping with condescending sarcasm):

It was not the Last Supper. It was a depiction of an ancient Greek Bacchanal.
Because, you know, the Olympics are ancient and Greek. Surprise!

Image link

But hang on. It was the Last Supper – the organisers foolishly apologised for that above – and Bacchanalia (the plural) were a ROMAN thing, not a Greek thing.
Bacchus was the Roman god of wine. He wasn’t Greek.

So actually, the Olympics are ancient and… er… Roman? No. Because that wasn’t a depiction of a Bacchanal. It was a depiction of the Last Supper with some added Dionysus.

Dionysian Mysteries are the Greek thing on which Bacchanalia were based: parties in honour of their god of wine-making: Dionysus.
Dionysus was also god of… just off the top of my head:

Orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre.

And yes – if you saw that bit of the opening ceremony – that does seem to fit the bill a little more accurately.

But if you’re going to write 500 words on how stupid people were to think that was the Last Supper (which it was), then at least get your facts straight. Because, as mentioned above:

The Bacchanalia were Roman festivals of Bacchus, the Greco-Roman god of wine, freedom, intoxication and ecstasy. They were based on the Greek Dionysia and the Dionysian Mysteries, and probably arrived in Rome c. 200 BC via the Greek colonies in southern Italy.

To be fair though, both Bacchus and Dionysus (I can’t speak for Jesus) regularly had their scrota (and often a lot more) hanging out when depicted in contemporary media.

So at least that bit was right.

The Opening Ceremony

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I mean, these things aren’t meant to be for the actual sports fans, are they?

I’d wager that literally less than 1% of the football fans in the Olympic Stadium in Berlin were bothered about the kids waving the special flags before the Euros final earlier in the month. And much like that wasn’t really part of the football, this wasn’t really part of the Olympic games.

Just an add-on.

It’s simply an excuse to dance and have lasers and play music and do… stuff.
And you’re never going to please all the people, all the time.

So why not just go wild?

Especially in France.

Accurate.

I actually thought it was quite fun. Really bizarre, but also really original. I loved the river vibe: why not break ties with the traditional stadium-based setup? It was courageous and different, and most of it worked.
The driving rain only added to the drama. And the religious iconography of that Last Supper scene [UPDATE: But actually, see here] was really quite something.

That said, the third hour of the horse running up the Seine was maybe a bit over the top.

Oh, and talking of over the top…

A moment that will stay forever with all of us that watched last night.
Despite many thousands of hours of therapy too, I’d guess.

New Nick Cave

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OK, so there’s only a lyric video out for Long Dark Night so far, but wow.
This was goosebump-inducing when I heard it on 6 Music this week. And so powerful was the reaction to that first play, that Mary Anne Hobbs (for it was she), played it again immediately afterwards. I’m not sure I remember that happening with any other record before.

Apparently inspired by the poem “Dark Night of the Soul” by the 16th-century Spanish poet St. John of the Cross, which Cave describes as:

…one of the greatest and most powerful poems of conversion ever written

Judge for yourself here.

Either way, it’s a compelling, dramatic, haunting track, which continues to bode well for the new album out at the end of next month.

Morocco v Argentina

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And the weirdest football report ever?

There was drama last night at the Stade ­Geoffroy-­Guichard in Saint-Étienne, in the Olympics, which have started even though they haven’t started yet.

It happened in the football, where a last minute equaliser – in the 16th minute of injury time! – from Argentina sparked a pitch invasion from the Morocco fans, including some Groucho Marx impersonators…

…and the players were taken off while the fans were cleared from the pitch.

This took quite a while, as Argentinian coach Javier Mascherano notes:

I can’t explain what happened. We spent about an hour and a half in the dressing room where they never told us what was going to happen. The Moroccan captains didn’t want to play, we didn’t want to continue, and fans threw things at us. It’s the biggest circus I’ve ever seen in my life.

And he used to play at clown club West Ham United, so you know it was bad.

Amazingly, after almost 2 hours, the goal which had sparked all the protests was ruled out in what must be the longest VAR decision (yet), meaning that the score was still 2-1 to Morocco, but that there was still some time to play.

The players were brought back out into the – now empty – stadium, where Morocco successfully kept a clean sheet for 3 minutes and were awarded the win.

That Guardian report I linked to above just shows how chaotic things were, with the actual URL reading like the goal wasn’t disallowed:

…the story obviously having been updated a little later.

Still, that’s better than the AP version of events,

The game was broadcast in cafes throughout Morocco, where national pride has swelled since the country advanced to the semifinal in the 2022 World Cup. During a record-breaking heat wave, tea-drinking men screamed at televisions and watched in shock as fans stormed the field.

Screaming tea-drinking men are bad enough, but screaming tea-drinking men during a record-breaking heat wave? Terrifying.

And where did they get these quotes?

Zak Eddakir, a 28 year-old from Rabat, said the fans’ reaction had to do with soccer’s importance in Morocco and a natural disappointment at a draw and the idea that a referee’s call could end a game.

What are you on about, Zak? The referee’s call always ends the game. The whistle thing, remember? That’s one of their key jobs. Otherwise games would literally never end. I know it might have felt like this one went on a bit, but if the referee hadn’t been there to make the final call, we’d still be watching.

And then, this:

Hairdresser Khadija Seffany streamed into the street to embrace her friends and neighbors after Morocco won.

Wut? How does an individual stream into a street? Is she wholly fluid? I know we’re made up of 70% water, but there are surely still some very unstreamable bits in a hairdresser. Bones, for a start, are notoriously solid and very poor at streaming.

She initially thought the delay in calling the goal offside suggested the referees wanted Argentina to win because Morocco is an Arab country.

No. The delay came because the Moroccan fans invaded the pitch. Were you not watching before you streamed onto the street?
And where on earth did you get that “the referees wanted Argentina to win because Morocco is an Arab country” thing from? Talk about desperate victim tactics.
This sounds a bit like something a Liverpool fan might say. (Sorry, TA.)

Does this ridiculous suggestion perhaps stem from the infamous Libya v Tunisia game last year in which both teams lost simply because they were Arab countries?
If so, I do kind of get it.
But then, since I just made that game up, you’re being daft.

Was it a different referees [sic] that disallowed the Argentinian goal, then? Presumably because something something Hispanic something? Ugh. Honestly, just go and flow back into your salon.

(Ironically, in the other game in this group, Iraq beat Ukraine.)
(With no pitch invasion required.)
(You work out the ethnicities.)

But there is one final word from the hydrous football expert Khadija before we go, and given her previous form, I’m expecting it to be an absolute banger…

Every match throughout the Olympics will be important.

Wow. World shattering stuff right there.
Stick to hairdressing, please.

Honestly, I don’t particularly like Argentina – not least because of this – but I would love to see Morocco chucked out of the competition because of their fans’ behaviour. Zak’s excuse about “natural disappointment at a draw” just sounds like Moroccans are bad losers… draw-ers?… and doesn’t really do a lot for me. Are we going to see this every time one of their athletes or teams loses?