Chilly Sydney
The temperature Tuesday morning in Sydney: 10 degrees. The first modern Olympics to be held in the southern hemisphere didn\'t bargain for one thing, it\'s winter down under.

Bemittened marching band members struggle with shiny sousaphones, athletes queue for extra blankets at the Olympic Village, foreign journalists in the chilly Main Press Centre bemoan not packing jumpers. It\'s all part of the weather roulette, which has seen storms scare sailing and canoeing competitors above all-and has the opening ceremony organisers speaking of their fear of thunder and lightning.

"They could stop the ceremony because there\'s so much high-tech involved," nervy officials admitted-only to be reassured that the latest forecast for the opening ceremony on 15 September is favourable, A "nice mild day" was the latest longer-range forecast for Friday of next week when the ceremony takes place-though followed by another of those "coo! nights".

The latter could wreak special havoc with the highly-sensitive men and women sprinters who will be doing battle for track and field\'s most coveted medals at 8 pm local time on 23 September. If temperatures continue to drop to around 10 degrees Celsius then, as they have been, the risks of injury to susceptible muscles will increase dramatically. And you can forget about any records.

On top of all this the main Olympic complex at Homebush Bay, where 14 different sports will be staged, has the reputation of being Sydney\'s windiest point.

Fans queue for remaining tickets
Olympic fans queued up for more than a kilometre this week to snatch up the remaining 150,000 tickets for some of the Olympics\' top events. Sydney Olympic organisers said the rush for the final tickets still could push the Olympic committee into profits for the two-week sporting spectacle.

Officials said last week they still need to sell some US$ 57 million in tickets to reach the black. One of the hottest tickets going were those for the 1,500m swimming final, which will include local hero Kieren Perkins, who won gold at the 1992 and 1996 Games. The 7,500 tickets for that event sold out in two hours.

Tickets for the basketball test showdown between Dream Team 4 of the United States and Australia Saturday night in Melbourne Park sold out in less than an hour.

Australia\'s "Olym-pique"
An Australian revolt gathered pace on the weekend over a demand from the International Olympic Committee that French take precedence over English at the 15 September opening ceremony of the Sydney Games.

Governor-General Sir William Deane has refused a request from IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch that he declare the Games open in French on 15 September. French and English, in that order, are the official Olympic languages.

The queen\'s representative in Australia has modern history on his side: only the language of the host country was used in the opening ceremonies for the Winter Games in Lillehammer and Nagano and the Summer Games in Atlanta.

Taking her cue from the governor-general, broadcaster Mary Kostakidis has withdrawn as master of ceremonies for the opening of an IOC conference at Sydney\'s Opera House after organisers demanded she speak in French first and then in English, "I guess it\'s a matter of principle over protocol." Kostakidis said. "We are in Australia, the majority of the people in the concert hall for this event would speak English and I thought it was a matter of principle to speak English."

French speakers are thin on the ground in cosmopolitan Sydney, where English is the lingua franca, followed in popularity by Arabic and then Chinese.

Sri Lanka\'s biggest ever contingent
The biggest ever contingent to take part in Olympic games from Sri Lanka left for Sydney with the main concentration on track events. The 19-member contingent consisting of 14 track athletes, two swimmers, two shooters and a lone yachtsman are taking part in the events. They left country early on Wednesday.

The contingent includes IAAF World Championship Silver Medallist Susanthika Jayasinghe. who will be taking part in the 100 metre. 200 metre and the 100 metre-relay events. Another champion sprinter. Damayanthi Darsha. is the team captain.

The contingent which is backed by 11 officials was given a colourful send off in the capital Colombo, The highest number to take part in an Olympic Games from Sri Lanka was at the 1992 Barcelona Games when it sent 11 members,

Sri Lanka has so far achieved success at an Olympic game only once when the late Duncan White won a Silver medal in the 1948 Olympic for the 200-metre hurdle event.