Are the Olympic Mascots Bad Omens?

Posted by John Kennedy for Global Voices Online

In case you ever wondered if those Olympic Fuwas weren’t just a little too cute to be true, apparently you aren’t the only one.

For China, the superstitious formula to that effect which has been making its way across various networks since the Sichuan earthquake looks accurate enough given the number of tragic events which have befallen China already this year. And mention of the Curse of the Fuwas [zh] has been getting deleted left and right and off Baidu and there are even separate versions, so the curse must really exist and the few criticisms of the notion [zh] that do still exist are powerless to stop it.

So, Sohu blogger Elvia Wu sums it up in a post that has since been deleted:

中国，08年的中国真是多事之秋呀！

从年初到现在，中国一直祸事连连。山东火车相撞、西藏闹事、奥运火炬在传递过程中被抢，现在成都又发生了大地震，死伤过万人！

近来在网上及手机短信中流传着这么一段话：

一个福娃头上是风筝，代表潍坊，于是山东出事了；
一个福娃是藏羚羊，于是西藏出事了；
一个福娃是火炬，于是火炬出事了；
一个福娃是熊猫，于是四川出事了；
现在还剩一条鱼 ….

对于中国目前的现状，国人是担忧的，这很能理解！

但我们不应该把奥运会与这些祸事相联。毕竟，奥运会是中国的光荣，是我们中华民族的光荣，是我们经过了很多努力之后才得来的荣誉。奥运福娃的设计是有突破的，是第一个以五个形象，以图组的形式出现在公众面前的。

奥运福娃的象征与这些祸事也许有些许巧合，但非要把这些事情联系在一起来说就是迷信了。

Then there were other evidence points, such as January 25 (01/25) being the day the heaviest snowfall in 50 years fell, paralyzing a large part of the country’s transportation and electricity networks, and 1+2+5 adding up to 8; the Tibetan riots broke out on March 14, so 3+1+4; the Shandong train collision occurred on April 28 (4*2=8), and the Sichuan earthquake on May 12. Then to top it all off, 8pm on August 8=888, sign of the Fuwa.

Most recently, the supposed curse has come full circle to bring Beibei into this, with torrential rain across large parts of the country which began on May 26 (2+6), setting records in Hong Kong, swallowing cars whole in Beijing, and flooding rivers from Jiangxi to hundreds of thousands displaced in Guangxi, which as Blogspot blogger Griffin Lee writes, only comes as the country is still left recovering from last month’s earthquake:

"earthquake’s problem hasnt solve yet n now flooding all over places in southern China,
this is a tragic scene , imagine u’re one of the victim or ur family or relaives r there."