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Japan girds for a surreal Olympics, and questions are plenty

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Posted at 2:57 AM, Jul 19, 2021
and last updated 2021-07-19 08:03:15-04

Tens of thousands of visiting athletes, officials and media are descending on Japan for a Summer Olympics unlike any other.

There will be no foreign fans, no local fans in Tokyo-area venues.

A surge of virus cases has led to yet another state of emergency, and a local vaccination campaign is struggling to keep up.

As athletes and their entourages arrive, they’ll be confined to a bubble. Government minders and GPS will try to track visitors’ every move; booze will be curtailed or banned, and, through it all, there will be the inescapable knowledge of the suffering COVID-19 has brought here and around the world.

It will all add up to an utterly surreal Olympics.