Did the political tensions add to the sweetness of the victory? “Absolutely,” he replied.Not that the result was exactly unexpected. Both teams had already qualified for the medal round, but it meant something in Havana, which has had to suffer nightly blackouts to conserve energy stocks denied by the US blockade of goods.”I expect there to be a great party in Havana tonight,” Jorge Fuentes, the Cuban coach, said after his team’s 10-8 victory. Forty years of hate, of glowering at each other across 90 miles of water, have wiped the smiles away. The Cubans do not dislike the United States, the word is too shallow for antipathy that is nurtured in the cradle.

Their very being seems to be aimed at putting one over on the not-so-benign Uncle Sam. You know the joy when they defeat the Americans at their own game. In their own backyard.
No matter that the baseball match at Atlanta, Fulton, County Stadium, was, in the context of the Olympic Games, meaningless. While he was out making funeral arrangements on Sunday, burglars broke into his home and stole his television set and video recorder, police said.. Atlanta – It is hard to remember that they were once friends. That they traded pleasure and goodwill along with cigars and sugar. A Turkish TV cameraman also died from a heart attack while rushing to the scene and more than 100 people were wounded, a dozen seriously.Mrs Hawthorne’s widower, John, has criticised Olympics officials for minimising the loss of his wife.

“No-one bothered to even call me up to give their condolences,” he said. There has been speculation here that some of these cities may drop their bids after seeing the psychological damage done to Atlanta.Today’s memorial service and the reopening of the park promises to be among the most emotional events here since the civil rights sermons of Martin Luther King. To many residents, the re-opening of their beloved “park” is being billed as more significant than last week’s opening of the Games.Atlantans have compared the scars of the bombing and their recovery to the way the city rose from the ashes of the Civil War in the mid-19th century.The focus of the memorial service will be 44-year-old ice cream parlour owner Alice Hawthorne, the only person who was killed by the pipe bomb. “We are determined to defy cowardice,” he said, adding that he could not confirm reports that some Olympics teams were leaving Atlanta early because of the bombing.Mr Brennan said the bombing had taught valuable lessons to the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games and to the special observer delegations from Sydney, which will host the Games in the year 2,000, and the cities which are bidding for the 2,004 event. It is paved with “sponsored” bricks, bearing the names of the people around the world who paid for them.Bob Brennan, spokesman for the Atlanta organisers of the Games, urged the public to defy terrorism, including threats from “copycats out there who’re finding great fun in disrupting the Games as much as they can”, by flocking to the re-opening. Gun rights advocates and civil liberties groups then attacked the ideas as a threat to the rights of individuals.Adding to the urgency of the White House summit was the question of security at the impending party conventions next month in San Diego and Chicago, in the run-up to the November presidential elections.Today’s reopening of Centennial Park, which is a paved, open-air, cultural, leisure and exhibition centre, is expected to be a symbolic moment for the residents of Atlanta.The park, built for the Olympics in a deserted, run-down area, was the focal point for the Games’ non-sporting activity, with free nightly concerts that ran into the small hours. Second, and as a partial consequence, she is the most popular and respected figure in the country.Suharto has never yet been challenged, but his clumsy sacking of Megawati has given her fellow citizens new ideas.