The Olympic Winter Games begin tonight in this Norwegian village, meaning you'll be doing what most Lillehammerians will be doing for the next 16 days - pulling up a chair in front of the big screen TV. Just because the venues are closer doesn't mean they're any more accessible. Being able to see the ski jumps is one thing; figuring out which bus to take to get to them is another; and getting a ticket is yet another.
TV and the Olympics are made for each other. They go together like the luge and gravity, like ice and Coke, like the IOC and five-star hotels. Veteran Olympic TV watchers know the experience can be enhanced by doing a little pre-Games homework, emphasis on "little." A lot of knowledge can be dangerous and make you sound like a full professor of biophysics, but a little knowledge can make you a kind of winterized version of John Madden.As Ole Gunnar Fidjestol prepares to carry the Olympic torch off the 90-meter jump tonight, herewith, as an exclusive Deseret News service, a cram course on the Games of '94. Call these the Cliff Notes of Lillehammer:
Fast Facts About the Host City: Lillehammer means, in English, "little hill," a reference to the city's geographical setting above the shores of Lake Mjosa, Norway's largest inland body of water (at the present time you have to take their word for it, since the lake is completely covered with snow). Twenty-three thousand people live permanently in Lillehammer, 22,000 of whom have relatives in Minnesota . . . Lillehammer claims to be the only city with a skier on its coat of arms, and it is here that the cheese slicer was invented . . . exactly how the village got the Olympics is anyone's guess, since there were no jumps, bobsled runs, luge runs, ski lifts or hockey rinks here until the bid was awarded, although there has never been a lack of ice and snow or, for that matter, little hills. Lillehammer is the central city in a two-county region of South Central Norway known as Troll Park . . . the average daily amount of sunlight is not much, the average daily temperature is cold.
Fast Facts About Trolls: Norwegians have a fixation about trolls, which are nothing more than beasts that live in the forests and thrive during the dark winter months; a troll can have one head, or two heads, or sometimes three heads, depending on how long it's been since you last saw daylight, and the key thing is most of them are nice, although not always. The rule of thumb upon meeting a troll in the forest is to be nice to the troll and wait until the sun comes up, at which point the troll will explode.
Venue Fast Facts: About half of the Olympic competitions will be contested in Lillehammer, with the rest spread out in areas fairly close by. The most exotic venue is in Gjovik, 46 kilometers from Lillehammer, where the hockey hall was tunneled out of a mountainside. All of the figure skating and speed skating competitions will be held in Hamar, 58 kilometers south of Lillehammer, where the Hamar Olympic Hall was built in the form of a Viking ship. The city of Hamar (pop. 26,000) was founded by the Viking king, Harald the Ruthless, in 1049, and will, appropriately enough, be the stage, lawsuits willing, for Tonya the Ruthless.
Other fast facts: Troll Park Norwegians are very protective of their trees; contractors building Olympic facilities faced fines of $7,500 if they cut down a tree (although they could cut into mountains free of charge) . . . drunk drivers are tolerated about the same as tree-slayers; a trace of alcohol in a driver's blood stream is grounds for conviction and a jail sentence . . . if you drink, don't drive in Lillehammer, not that you could anyway during the next 16 days of bans on private cars . . . these Games are being billed as the first-ever "smoke-free Olympics," which means a lot of Frenchmen might soon find themselves talking to a lot of trolls . . . the average Olympic bus will drive 250 miles every day . . . a "Northern Lights" sighting is a possibility at tonight's opening ceremonies. The Northern Lights is a rare phenomenon created when particles from the sun enter the magnetic field surrounding the earth. Conditions need to be clear and dark, a Lillehammer specialty in February.
As for tonight's opening ceremonies, the most spectacular moment should come when the aforementioned ski jumper, Ole Gunnar Fidjestol, leaps off the jumping hill, lands, and hands the torch to Crown Prince Haakon, who will in turn light the eternal cauldron - all of this in front of a worldwide TV audience of around 1 billion. The dramatic moment could only be upstaged, arguably, if Fidjestol doesn't land the jump.