Thursday, January 08, 2009

Life and the Vendee Globe

Life is not like the movies: it is not fair. On the big screen a little act of kindness will be rewarded, right will overcome wrong, and the good guys beat the bad.

But that is not the way the world always works.

In the real world good people get lurgies they shouldn't.

In the real world when one reads in the news of a Gaza school being bombed and of staved children holding onto the dead body of their mothers, one also hears how the victims are blamed and the attackers get the unquestioned support of the world's most powerful nation and the world's most powerful man.

So the Vendee Globe too is unfair, as after Vincent Riou went out of his way to rescue Jean Le Cam, rather than being rewarded, his boat PRB broke its mast.

All we can do, and should do, is honour Vincent's brave, valiant, and successful rescue effort and give him all our support at the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune".

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great post JP. It has to be the most unfair of unfair races. It's crazy how bad luck and bad equipment plays such a huge part.

JP said...

Its a gripping race to watch, but also tragic, as so much hard work, preparation and hopes comes to nothing for so many of the talented competitors.