Olympics Cities Destination Quiz (4 of 6) Melbourne-Munich

Today, we continue our Olympics Cities Destination quiz series in honor of the 2012 London Olympics, which start on July 29th, with a look at how far Melbourne, Australia, and Munich, Germany, are.

Apologies to our international audience as we are doing this in miles.

Melbourne hosted the 1956 Olympics, which were the first ones held in Australia. They are one of  only two  summer games where athletic events were held outside the host country as equestrian events were held in Stockholm, Sweden; the other games where an event took place away from the home was 1920 Antwerp Olympics in Belgium, in which yachting events were held in neighboring Holland.

Some of the highlights of the Melbourne games were Australian men's swimmer Murray Rose (1939-2012) who died in April winning three gold medals; his teammate Dawn Fraser (pictured above) won two gold medals for the host country.

Munich hosted the 1972 Olympics which were greatly overshadowed by tragedy as Palestinian terrorist took 11 Israeli coaches and athletes hostage and later killed them in what became known as the Munich Massacre.

But, there were also tremendous athletic accomplishments in then-West Germany as American men's swimmer Mark Spitz, now 62, won seven gold medals which was recently surpassed by Michael Phelps.

Similarly, women's Soviet/Belarusian gymnast Olga Korbut, now 57, won three gold medals while also performing a ground-breaking backward somersault on the balance beam.

 Korbut was on a 1996 postage champ issued by the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan; she now lives in Arizona.

Quote of the Day/Week-Olga Korbut

Today, in honor of the upcoming 2012 London Olympics, we are quoting the great Belorussian gymnast Olga Korbut who competed for the Soviet Union in the 1972 Munich Olympics and again at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, which saw the emergence of Romanian gymnastics star Nadia Comaneci. Korbut, 56, who now lives in Arizona, won four gold medals and two silvers during her Olympic career.

We quoted Korbut back in November when we were quoting famous Russians. We quickly saw on Korbut's Wikipedia page that we had whoops!, made a major mistake. Today, Belarus and Russia are two separate countries.

Here is her quote:

"This is probably why, my life is easier, and my family is very happy, because we never lie (to) each other."

Quote of the Week- Fyodor Dostovesky

Today's quote of the day comes from another Russian (well, the Olympic gymnast Olga Korbut whom we quoted last week is actually from Belarus) as we continue to quote famous Russians this month as the famous October revolution happened in that country 'a few years back.'

And, today, we go with a quip from Fyodor Dostovesky (1821-1881) who penned "Crime and Punishment," "The Idiot" and "The Brothers Karamazov."

Here is his quote:

"Beauty is mysterious and as well as terrible. God and devil are fighting there, and the battlefield is the heart of man."

Quote of the Week- Olga Korbut

Today's quote of the week comes from Olga Korbut, (whoops! I just realized she is from Belarus, not Russia) as we quote famous "Russians." Korbut (b. 1955) was a famed Olympic gymnast who won gold at the 1972 Munich Olympics.

Here is her quote:

"It's better to have a rich soul than to be rich."