Japan, this week

Skating rinks around the country have been inundated with new sign-ups as Japan basks in the glory of square-headed Shizuka Arakawa's Olympic victory. The figure skating queen showed off her best wares, skating leg-up and muff-first to Japan's first and only gold medal of the Turin Olympic Games. Inspired by Arakawa's flawless long program to secure top position on the podium, females fat and thin have been flocking to skating rinks hoping to have some chance of imitating the jabba-jawed champion.

"It's quite funny," said Rink manager Mitsuo Itagaki. "Since Arakawa's win we've had dozens of mothers bringing their daughters down and forcing them to stumble around on the ice, screaming out 'loop!', 'double axel!' and 'triple lutz!' as if they'd have the remotest fucking idea what those moves entail. We even had one ignorant mum calling out 'Komeneci!' which had the instructors here in fits of laughter. Still, as long as these people fork over the money they can have their tikes doing backward flips from the pike position for all I care."

But there is a darker side to all this new-found hope: the over-crowded rinks are recording unprecedented numbers of accidents. Inexperienced juniors are being forced to perform moves they are hardly equipped to handle, leading to collisions, cuts, bruises and less than glorious experiences for the little ones on their first venture onto the ice. Determined mother Masumi Kawaguchi told the Rising Sun-Times that her little Yuri was a natural to go on to Olympic glory.
"She's got the figure for it, you see," the proud mother said gazing out as her 58 kg 7 year old crashed into another skater, "once she loses the puppy fat, that is. OI!! You won't win the gold medal by sitting around on your arse all day whimpering! Now get up and do me one of them Biellman things!!"

Discuss