SOCHI, Russia — As a rule, nobody wants to hear journalists complain about travel, which is fair. Travel, if you are lucky, is a part of the job. It’s like complaining about traffic, but somewhere else.
At the Olympics, though, the standard is different, because the Olympics are a comprehensive test. The venues, security, the athletes, transportation, the media, everything. Not every Games reflects on its nation in the same way — Atlanta, for instance, wasn’t so much a pan-American project in 1996 as it was a local disaster, in so many ways.
But Sochi, like Beijing, is different; it is a hideously complex logistical test of how efficiently a country, directed from on high, can pull the whole thing off with nearly unlimited resources. And by that measure, Sochi, its Olympic facilities built practically from scratch, is having some trouble.
“In general, it is done,” said one media hotel worker who has spent the past two years in Sochi, after coming from Siberia. “But the details are not done. And the details are everything.”
