The 2010 Winter Olympi.jpgcs will kick off in Vancouver in less than a month.  

The official dates are February 12-28, 2010, with events taking place in both Vancouver and Whistler, Canada. 

Close to 100 countries are expected to participate in the games, including South Africa. Participants will compete in 86 sports – sports that take place on either ice or snow, like hockey, skating, skiing, and luge. (If you don't know what luge is, I strongly recommend you watch it!)

One of the symbolic traditions of the games is the Olympi.jpgc Torch Relay, and the lighting of the Olympi.jpgc flame that takes place at the opening ceremony.  For these Olympi.jpgcs, the flame was lit in Olympi.jpga Greece in October 2009, and by next week, will have travelled over 45,000 kilometres in just over 100 days. It will be carried by approximately 12,000 Canadians as it makes its way across the host country. 

The Vancouver 2010 Olympi.jpgcs kick off what's to be an exciting year of global, international events, which also include the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and the World Expo in Shanghai.