‘Over-excited’ woman gatecrashes India’s Olympic entrance
Spot the odd one out.
There's always one: that guest whom no one really seems to know, and whom everyone assumes must have been invited by somebody else.
That might work at a house party, but it's not going to cut it at the Olympics.
In what was possibly the most brazen gatecrashing of all time, an unidentified woman decided to join India's delegation as they made their big entrance to the Olympic Stadium in London during Friday's opening ceremony.
And by "join," we don't mean she tagged along at the back; oh no, this lady put herself front and center ahead of the entire group. That is, around 50 people dressed in matching yellow and navy uniforms, from whom the mystery woman – sporting bright blue jeans and a red hooded jacket – stood out like a sore, and uninvited, thumb.
After much speculation in the Indian press, the gatecrasher has now been identified as a cast member who had taken part in an earlier section of the opening ceremony and become "slightly over-excited."
According to the BBC, the head of London's Olympics organizing committee, Lord Sebastian Coe, told reporters today that the woman "shouldn't have been there," but assured that there was no security breach since she was in the stadium already.
He said he would speak to Team India about the incident, but it might take more than that to unruffle the delegation's feathers.
"We will ask for an apology," India's chef de mission, PK Muralidharan Raja, told the Times of India. "[The woman] embarrassed us in front of the world… the Indian contingent was shown for just 10 seconds, and to think this lady hogged all the limelight."
Raja fired off a letter advising organizers of India's "strong resentment" of the intrusion, he informed the Press Trust of India.
According to the Deccan Chronicle, the "lady in red" is supposedly an Indian national living in London. The paper tracked down her Facebook account, which apparently proudly displayed her Olympics passes – until she became India's least-welcome Olympian, at which point the profile was deleted.