Alternative Olympics: the wrestler

Lise Munro is a New Zealander who loves sport but not the London Olympics.

Hackney Wick is full of artists, musicians and some of east London’s more unique characters who resent changes the Games have brought to the area they call home.

“I’m all for the sport but I feel that England’s in a really major recession and the last thing we need to be spending our money on is something like that”, she told Channel 4 News.

Lise is also angry about the impact the Olympics will have on her ability to get to her day job: “I’ve already figured out it’s going to take me an hour and 40 minutes each way … the reality is I’m not going to be able to get public transport the way I usually do because I go through Stratford.

“The other problem is I have a dog and my dog walker can’t come and take her for a walk during the Olympics while I’m at work.”

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Echoing many of Hackney Wick’s artists, Lise does not understand why authorities have spent time and money cleaning graffiti.

“It’s not offensive, it’s not mindless, it’s actually pieces of art on the walls that people are doing for free,” she said.

“Seven years ago they started painting over them, well they just go up again the next night. Seven years of paying someone to paint over a canal’s length of walls why not just wait until the week before the Olympics instead of wasting all that money. It’s ridiculous.”

Lise also has concerns about multinational corporations sponsoring the Games: “Obesity is killing more people in the Western world than most things and we’ve got McDonald’s sponsoring the Olympics? Come on – that’s hypocrisy.

“I want it to be a good thing, I want it to be a right thing and I want it to be a sporting thing but when it’s sponsored by McDonalds and when it’s getting rid of local people who have been living here for most of their lives – nah!”