Team USA gymnasts Simone Biles and Laurie Hernandez are world class athletes at very young ages.
Biles, at just 19, has a very good chance at winning five gold medals for Team USA. Dominant in the vault, floor exercise and balance beam and the clear-cut gold medal favorite for the all-around competition, Biles comes to the Rio Olympics as the reigning all-around champion of the world and took the Olympic Trials by storm.
Hernandez is one of the youngest athletes on Team USA at just 16, and her generally sassy floor exercise should make her an entertaining athlete to watch. Hernandez placed second all-around at the Olympic Trials for Team USA.
So, besides the fact that they will become significantly more accomplished athletically in a couple of weeks than many, many other athletes ever hope to be, they are still ultimately teenagers. And teenagers tend to enjoy things like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat, technology that tends to require electricity.
That’s going to be an issue for Biles and Hernandez, because their room in the Olympic Village does not have outlets.
So, with the last bit of energy her phone may have had, Biles took to Snapchat to record Hernandez having a mini crisis in the realization that their room does not contain something they obviously need.
While their complaint is definitely comical, the issues with Rio de Janeiro’s housing quarters for the Olympians is no laughing matter.
Earlier this week, Australia conducted a “stress test” on the village’s electric and toilet system. The facility failed, resulting with water leaking down the walls and an overwhelming scent of gasoline in the rooms. The Guardian reported earlier this week that 19 of the 31 buildings within the Olympic Village have not passed a safety inspection.
Those issues don’t even include the fact that Jiu Jitsu Olympian Jason Lee was kidnapped by police during his stay in Rio, and that open water athletes were told to “keep their mouths closed” while they swam, as they will “literally be swimming in human (feces).”
Another threat, the Zika virus, may not be as great of an issue as earlier thought, but it still remains as a looming reminder of the dangers the upcoming Olympics brings to athletes and fans all around the world.
The games are set to begin Aug. 5, so there is an extremely tight window to fix some of these issues.
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