I was listening to the radio this morning here in the UK and was told how my nation has united behind the Olympic spirit. The cozily pompous presenter, James Naughtie, one of the BBC’s Today programmes most unctuous self-regarding legends, waxed lyrically about the rising sun gleaming gold on London’s Olympic Stadium and told me that we were all excited. Actually, I was wondering what to have for breakfast.

Well, what is real personal excitement and what is this apparent feeling that we the British are all excited, united and brought together for these Games? I dunno. A lot of Mr Naughtie’s excitement, of course, was at being a BBC presenter sitting in a box with a view of all the preparations within the Olympic stadium. It’s exciting too, no doubt, reporting and having to wax lyrical live on the radio.

The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson does excitement well, if he ever gives up politics, he should try selling carpets. He has been sounding excited for weeks now and he is sure to keep up the moment through out the Games. Our politicians, are all sounding excited, hoping that some Olympic gold dust will rub off on their drabness. No such luck for Prime Minister David Cameron who manages to make  even exciting things sound dull.  Poor guy, he’ll do anything now to dig his failing government out of the worsening double-dip recession. what is the  opposite of the Midas Touch? Whatever it is, David Cameron has it. His hope that the Olympics will encourage billions of overseas investment in Britain from visiting dignitaries is just far-fetched. They’re only here for the corporate hospitality.

Excited too, apparently, were the thousands of people who lined the streets to see the Olympic torch relayed through our towns. Here in  Lewes, I went to see the phenomenon but only really saw a flash of torch and a lot of corporate advertising. I did feel excited though as I made my way down to see if I could see that torch – an excitement left unfulfilled. There’s a lot of controlled hype in our newspapers today as well. We’re being told that we are all desperate to see the opening ceremony, a mystery revealed tonight. Are we as desperate to know as the papers suggest? in the end, I fear, we are just swept along on the river of media hysteria.

Mostly, the little that I have watched, I have found those Olympic opening ceremonies fundamentally garish, vulgar and, somehow, cold-hearted. I wondered if all those thousands of Chinese ceremony pawns were really united and thrilled by their part in the admittedly spectacular event –  drilled for months from early morning til nightfall. I’m open to persuasion by tonight’s event but I’m suspicious of big, crowd rousing, rallies especially when our polticians, media and marketing men, tell us that this is “historic”, “iconic”, “exciting” etc. etc. and, especially, when they tell us that it is “uniting the nation.” How do they know? At best it is wishful thinking.

No, for me at least the excitement is in the athleticism of these men and women who are coming together in London to push themselves to their limits and to share with us all the wonder of the human body. I don’t need any marketing propaganda, verbose radio presenters or any oily politicians to inflame my excitement at those moments when sporting records are broken by athletes performing what words, especially hyped ones,  fail to convey.

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It is great idea, the Olympic Torch Relay – inspirational in an epic way. The flame of the Olympic spirit lit in Greece and then carried through Britain, brought to the people in advance of this the “People’s Games” – the great 2012 British Olympic Games.

Everyone would get to see it – Prime Minister David Cameron made it for the photo opportunity at Woodstock near his country retreat…

The Queen was amazed by it at Windsor Castle and Prince Philip was thrilled – or was he being ironic?

London Mayor Boris Johnson did his inimitable bit for the press….

..and everyone’s hero David Beckham did what he does best. He stood there and smiled for the cameras.

The cameras were out in my home town of Lewes too this week when it was our turn to thrill to the excitement of actually seeing the torch relayed through our streets.

The crowds gathered….

Everywhere, in the run up to the actual games which start in a couple of weeks, everywhere we are confronted with the big guys of this festival – the Olympic Sponsors. The crowds roared, well they’d been standing there for nearly an hour awaiting the exciting moment. First, in blazing red, the Coca Cola coach blaring pop out pop songs on its tinny speakers….

 …then more cheers as along came Samsung with a troup of rather desperate-looking people in Samsung uniforms….

and finally, everyone’s, er,  favourite these days, the bankers….Lloyds TSB with some nice people from the bank waving and looking slightly embarrassed, even surprized as the small children waved and cheered. I suspect everyone was just willing to cheer anything that went by in anticipation of the great Olympic Torch sighting. Don’t blink though at these events because, after all the big coaches and the music….

a bloke with a torch flit past and then, seconds later, it was all over. A shame that his effort was so upstaged by those giants from the big bad world of corporate sponsorship who, here in Lewes at least, showed just how much they misunderstand the original spirit of the games. We wanted to see the torch just like we want to see the Olympic athletes when the time comes for the games proper. I hope that we can contain the vulgarity and commercial cynicism of the sponsors, who are stamping their authority and their branding on the proceedings with unprecedented aggression.

Maybe that man in Henley was more in the spirit of the original games when he streaked in front of the torch with Free Tibet written on his back.

After-all the original Greek athletes performed naked but that would never be allowed these days…..

…where would the sponsors stick their logos?

The idea behind the Olympic Torch Relay started with the infamous Berlin Olympics and there too, a noble idea was soon branded with distasteful imagery that had nothing to do with the Olympic spirit.

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