The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Mascot from city for Olympics

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Thursday, Jul 24, 2008
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Mascot from city for Olympics

Staff Reporter

‘Huanhuan’ inspires athletes to run faster
and jump higher

‘Huanhuan’, the mascot designed by Unique Inflatables.

Hyderabad: The Beijing Olympics is all set to have our very own Hyderabadi touch to it. A city-based company is supplying inflatables of ‘Huanhuan’, one of the five Olympics mascots.

A consignment of 50 inflatables of ‘Huanhuan’ has already been airlifted to Beijing by Unique Inflatables Ltd, its Managing Director R. Ramdev told newspersons here on Wednesday.

‘Huanhuan’, which symbolises the Olympic flame, is placed in the centre among four other mascots and is believed to be a personification of the Olympic spirit. A crimson coloured child, he inspires athletes to run faster and jump higher. The five mascots represent the five Olympic rings. ‘Huanhuan’ representing the red ring is the middle.

Other mascots

The other four mascots are: ‘Beibei’, in the blue Olympic ring symbolising a fish or water; ‘Jingjing’ – black ring represents a Panda symbolising strength; ‘Yingying’ – yellow ring represents an antelope symbolising agility; and ‘Nini’ – green ring represents a bird, symbolising a gymnast’s grace. Unique Inflatables bagged the order from the Olympics Organising Committee after competing with American, European and local Chinese firms. The inflatables are cool air inflated and are three-metre high. It took 18 days for them to manufacture the inflatables worth Rs. 65 lakh and the consignment was sent to Beijing on Tuesday. This would be a hat-trick for Unique Inflatables in supplying inflatables to the Olympics. It had also supplied mascot inflatables for Olympics in Sydney (2000) and Athens (2004).

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