If you've ever sat down for a local Chinese meal, you're probably familiar with the foreigner-favorite 'tomato and egg' (番茄炒蛋). Everyone loves the dish, but it becomes less than appetizing when worn.
That is the case with the Chinese Olympic team's formal uniform. Every year, Chinese netizens have mocked their national athlete's uniform and envied the beautiful uniforms of other countries.
This year's formal uniform was unveiled in an Olympic ceremonial event on Tuesday, according to FS Online. The uniform for Rio has two types for men and women. Men will wear a red jacket, white dress shirt, multi-colored tie, white pants and white shoes, while women are to be dressed with a yellow jacket, multi-colored scarf and white pencil skirt. Take a look for yourself:
Ye Chaoying, designer of the uniforms, alluded to China's love for red and said she chose it because it represents good news. However, she also explained that when Chinese athletes win (which happens quite a bit), they drape the Chinese flag onto their back. With this uniform, athletes can walk into the opening ceremony feeling like they've already won.
Fair point, but we gotta point out that this nothing new, as past 'tomato and egg' (or 'ketchup and mustard') uniforms were red and yellow as well. Spot the difference? Turns out this year's shade of red is slightly more yellow, whereas the 2008 one used a 'Tiananmen red' and the 2012 version was just the national flag's shade of red.
China's 2012 Olympic look
2008 was a great year for China... except for in the Olympic uniform department.
For fencing Olympic champion Lei Sheng, the Rio Olympics will be the third time he dons the Chinese Olympic formal uniform. He expressed that the uniform's cloth this year is lighter, more flexible, and brighter in color.
So what did onlookers have to say about the uniform? Online comments on FS Daily were overall not very nice.
User @XiaoXiaoLanDiao wrote, 'This needs to be specially designed? You can buy as many as you want in a wholesale farmers' market!'
@FengYing, meanwhile, made an unfortunate comparison by commenting, 'At least it looks better than our school uniform.'
Many other netizens suggested adding some more creativity to future uniforms with different colors or patterns.
If people don't like the Chinese Olympic uniforms, how did those of other countries compare? Let's take a look at the best and worst dressed at London 2012's opening ceremony, shall we?
Though some complained that they didn't look patriotic enough, Team USA's uniform was still consistantly put in the 'best' category. Good on you, Ralph Lauren.
What was Germany thinking... Thought those colors went out of style in the early 90's?
It should count as cheating to have your uniforms designed by Giorgio Armani. We especially love how the ladies rocked their looks.
Okay, to be fair, maybe red and yellow are just difficult colors to pair, but Spain's hats add to the outfit so much.
But at least China's 'tomato and egg' is definitely not the ultimate worst, thanks Malaysia!
[Images via Yahoo News, Chifan Baike, FS Online, Hangzhou, Avenue Swank, China Daily, China.org.cn]
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