‘We Jammin’ – A Note to IOC Chairman Jacque Rogge

 You may have to check out this link first in order to fully appreciate the interventions I make here:

http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/track_field/news?slug=dw-rogge082108&prov=yhoo&type=lgns

I think everyone who has met a Jamaica knows all too well that there is no shortage of confidence in the Jamaican people. Bolt is the quintessential Jamaican  who loves life and gives voice to all that he feels.  IOC Chairman, Jacque Rogge should know that we get mad with the same gusto so let them tick us off in Beijing and then they would see a burning track/stadium literally rather than metaphorically!!

 

After 500 years of enslavement and oppression, and more than a century of global achievement in many arenas – music, film, fashion and sport, we have people with more than enough to celebrate. We do this by dancing and prancing! Every single night there is a party in Jamaca, sometimes several in one night. Dancehall researcher, Dr. Donna Hope and myself had gone to Tivoli for the weekly Passa Passa in its infancy a few years ago, and concluded that it was as if Jamaicans were dancing to forget the pain of impoverishment, crime, and deprivation. We had never seen a more happy set of poor people!!

We thanked God then for blessing Jamaica with such a wonderful musical form that Jamaicans obsessivly love. The rhythms are so potent, the lyrics so inflammatory and the vibe so intense that one immediately forgets the troubles in his own life and just move to the lilting beat. Bolt overcome by his own accomplishment felt that same reggae beat – not in his head – but in the stands as the Olympic organisers appropriately found himn some reggae. Asians are mad for reggae so it was a perfect international, reggae, Jamaican moment.

 

It helped Bolt that Jamaica has had dancers such as Bogle (may he rest in peace), and a crew of other who create a new dance move for the dancehall and the population to follow. Jacque Rogge should come on a visit to Tivoli and “Passa Passa” to see the dancers at work – to bear witness to how Jamaicans celebrate their own. Raver Clavers are on a high as they are busy watching Bolt popularising their dance moves for the world to watch. Dancing, music and fun is what we do! It’s the ‘reggaementality’ of the Jamaican people. Boasty and show off is part of the collective psyche – but we remain a people from hiumble beginnings/circumstances, and we know when to turn off the celebration and focus!

 

We love competition, Jamaicans love to win! I was at the National Stadium in Kingston when bolt first broke Asafa Powell’s record – and I nearly bust my throat – it was pandemonium in the stands. Jacque Rogge may also want to come visit Jamaica for the High School Boys and Girl’s Athletics Championships to catch a glimpse of the seriousness with which we take track and field. Years after leaving high school, grown men and women still turn out in their thousands to celebrate the victories of their secondary schools. It is a national pasttime. Better still, IOC President, Jacque Rogge should come to Jamaica to watch “Prep School Champs”!! haha! Now, I went to the stadium with my friend Ingrid to wtch her 9 year old , Rachel run in 207, in one of these kids’ races, and I will say the excitement and the pandemonium could equal that of the Bird’s Nest in Bejing.

 

Rioutous behaviour is embedded in the Jamaican personality; So is hyperbole. Jamaica is perhaps the only country plagued by extreme poverty which acts, thinks looks, and operates like a first world nation. We have an incestuous love of ‘Jamrock’.  And we deserve to celebrate as we see fit. In any case, Bolt does a BAD (read as ‘good’) ‘nuh linger’. Pity we did not have the ‘nuh linger’ tune to match. Perhaps next Olympics! Dem would need to hire a bad sound system/selector like the eternal Stone Love and Weepow – well – if the respectable, civilised, conservative Brits would allow it!

Lest we forget ASAFA POWELL !

Congratulations to Usain Bolt! He has renewed our nation’s confidence, and reclaimed respect for Jamaica’s long and proud history of achievement in World Athletics, and our historical place and presence among the global community.

But lest we collectively forget, in our (justified) stampede to crown Usain Bolt our new black King of the track, it was Asafa Powell’s extraordinary talent that first returned glory and pride to Jamaica, after decades of American dominance in track and field, particularly the 100m. While we heap praises on Usain Bolt, let us acknowledge the ambivalent position in which this 100m final placed the country – to support one or the other of our country men while hoping that they both medal.

I, personally, supported Asafa, and naturally felt an enormous surge of sadness when he failed to place. Many Jamaicans, as I did, would have been delayed in their own own joy for Jamaica and for Bolt as a result.

Asafa Powell is to be praised for making the finals, in a race with superlatively strong competitors, and where the World Record holder, the celebrated Tyson Gay, failed to make. The 100m is a high pressure race, more so because of the attention and promotion given to it as the stellar race of the Olympics.

To have had three Jamaicans in the final is a mark of Jamaica’s greatness in athletics, and a mark of the composure and innate mental strength of our athletes. Asafa Powell, plagued over the last few years by injury, loss of form, nerves and anxiety as well as his own self-doubt, managed to retain his composure to the end. That his legs/mind failed to offer him that final push does NOT take away from his prowess as an athlete. When the history of World Sport is written, he shall go down as one of the greatest athletes of his generation.

Records were made to be broken. He broke records, and then broke them again,and finaly had it taken off him. The burden upon him has finally been lifted. Now he can run his true race. God bless Asafa Powell. May God bless his parents, the Reverend and Mrs Powell for giving our nation this gift. Asafa Powell remains MY champion, and ought to remain Jamaica’s other King of the Track.

To my respected friend and colleague journalist, Tony Morrison  who refers to Asafa Powell a “wus”, I say this:

To call Asafa a ‘wuss’ is just DISRESPECTFUL and irrelevant to this discourse.

A ‘wuss’ cannot ‘redefine 100m sprint” as you so articulately put it.

A ‘wuss’ cannot break a world record – albeit his own – 9 times in one season (prior to Athens 2004).

A ‘wuss’ cannot/WILL NEVER make an Olympic final in the 100m consecutively.

Asafa is a wold class athlete! He was and IS a champion. History will more than recall him! It has recalled lessor champions ( Donnovon Bailey, Linford Christie) over the 100m.

Celebrate Usain, but do not undermine the value of  Asafa- the athlete who gave us much to celebrate over the last four years.

Lest we forget, it was Asafa Powell who resusitated Jamaica’s Olympic hopes during the 2004 Athens games when the runner on the third leg of the 4X4 relay stumbled and fell. It was Asafa Powell who met him on the ground, retrieved the baton from his sweaty palms – and just when – we thought our chances of medalling had been lost – sprinted with all his might to catch and surpass some five athletes to secure for Jamaica a medal. It was blessed day in Athens and it was Asafa who gave Jamaica that moment to celebrate.

Maybe Asafa is the sacrficial lamb who was meant to cosmically surrender the 100m in Beijing 08 to pave the way for history to be recorded by Usain Bolt and for Jamaica land we love. 60 years we had waited for this moment. A nation never achieve this kind of glory without giving up something significant. As an early Quaker missionary to Jamaica had declared “Jamaica is destined to exert an influence upon humanity, disporportionate to its territorial extent”.