The information super lay-by

I've been disconnected from the global media circus for a week. No computers, no emails, no blogging, no TV. What a nice break. I went to Baarlo (in Limburg) for a week's Buddhist training course - (photos to follow when I get up to speed with my photo management software). For me it was triple course because Dutch was very definitely the lingua franca of most people there - so if I wanted to keep up with the conversations over coffee or around the dinner tables then I had to focus on my Dutch. And I had volunteered to be on the 'soka spirit' group - the 'housekeepers' for the course: making sure everything ran smoothly - from waking people in the morning to ensuring the microphones are working OK, that the coffee arrives on time - to serving drinks in the bar in the evening. As half of the soka spirit group did not speak good English most of our planning meetings were in Dutch - with me chiming in for a translation when I felt that I had missed something important. So a triple challenge to face up to. 18 hour days, studying and practising Buddhism, being a volunteer caretaker and most of this in my third language.

I came home inspired but exhausted. This weekend I have been a complete couch potato, sleeping and enjoying the pleasure of drinking tea made with boiling water rather than with water that had been boiled in the past hour and had been kept in a thermos flask since then.

My time clock went out of sync (probably all that tea). I woke in the middle of the night in time to watch live coverage of the women's marathon. Since my childhood I have always been a fan of the track and field events - and it is so fascinating to see how the medals are going this year. Of twelve events so far, the golds are split between nine countries - Jamaica, Russia and Ethiopia head the list with two each - but then you see small countries like Cameroon, Slovenia, Poland and Ukraine carrying off golds too (and so far nothing but a bronze for team USA). The most amazing performances I have seen so far have been Ussain Bolt in the men's 100m- the fastest man on earth setting a new world record and looking like he wasn't even trying, the Russian woman (I'm not even going to try to spell her name) who just ran away with the steeplechase (again a world record) and the Romanian who took the the women's marathon by the scruff of its neck half way in and ran away from the pack and left them all behind her.

I do remember when the Olympics were very much an ideological battlefield between the USA and the USSR for top spot with the GDR and DDR (East and West Germany) battling it out for third spot. This year Team GB is third in the medals table! Ahead of Australia, Germany and Japan. Unprecedented. Normally if Team GB finishes in the top 10 that could be considered a good result. But now less and less GB medals come from the track and field. The Africans completely dominate the long distance events, the Caribbean islands have taken over the sprints from the USA and the Eastern Europeans continue to be hugely successful in the jumping and throwing events. It would be nice to see a Brit come with a gold on the track - but I'm not going to hold my breathe for it.