The eyes of the world have been on Paris as the city hosts the 2024 Olympics, with the media covering a wide range of topics in their reporting - including the locations Paris has chosen to hold some of the competitions.
One of the more talked about venues is the Seine River.
Back when Paris announced that the long polluted Seine River, which has banned swimming for decades, would be the location of choice for certain swimming events, it caused a lot of controversy.
There were protests being held to keep numbers of E. Coli high, and constant failing of water tests.
However, despite it all, Paris was able to pull it off when many people thought it to be impossible.
Julliette Mallie, a resident of Paris said they have been skeptical that the river would be useable for the Olympics.
“There was just no way. My friends and I kept seeing flyers and videos on TikTok talking about whether or not the river would actually be ready in time and all we would say was there was simply no way that it happened," she said.
Despite the mentality that some took to seeing this as simply not possible, the city of Paris was able to pull it off, as the triathletes were able to dive in on July 31. This came to a shock to many, as organizers had to cancel training sessions and even postpone the men’s race just the day before.
“When the men’s triathlon got postponed I thought it was pointless, and they were just delaying the inevitable… Paris picking this and the surfing site (in Tahiti) felt very questionable to a lot of us,” said Mark Brown, a USA fan attending the events in Paris.
While the events involving the Seine have moved forward, it's not been without controversy. On Sunday, the Belgium Olympic committee announced that they would be withdrawing their team from the mixed relay triathlon after one of their athletes who swam in the river last week fell ill. It's not immediately certain whether this illness was directly tied to swimming in the river.
Another Olympic venue that has created crontrovery is the site for Olympic surfing at Teahupo’o, Tahiti, aka the ‘wall of skulls’.
With Teahupo’o being roughly 9,800 miles away, it is the furthest location away from the Games, and it has a lot of talk around it. The village is off the southern coast of Tahiti with the waves being at their highest in the summer and some waves exceeding 20 feet.
They’re known for having some of the heaviest waves in the world. It’s actually so dangerous here that women weren’t allowed to have competitions from 2006-2022.
Approaching this year's Olympics, the International Surfing Association came out with a statement saying that for this year's Olympics, wearing a helmet is recommended because of the exceptionally dangerous conditions.
The controversies at these venues have left some like USA women's soccer team Bryant Black looking for more infomation.
“It would be nice to know what’s going on with these locations. I feel like there was so much drama around building up to the games,” he said.