You're either with Romania or Hungary in women's handball.

I was eating lunch yesterday at a downtown Beijing restaurant while the closest TV was showing the Sweden-Norway women's handball quarterfinals match.

Being a captive viewer, I ended up watching about 30 minutes of handball, a sport I've never seen before, played by two countries I think about maybe once every six months.

Slowly, however, as I ate my beef stew, I found myself rooting for the Swedes with their pretty yellow and blue uniforms.

Why the Swedes?

First off, I'm the world's most impartial person when it comes to what I imagine is a heated rivalry between the Scandinavian giants.

Yet still, my heart went out to those blue-and-yellow jerseyed players getting beaten by those wicked Norwegians. How quickly such loyalties form. Why?

The main reason, I thought, were all those Ingmar Bergman movies I've seen over the years. I know the Swedes. I know they wrestle a lot with their wavering faith in God and that death really freaks them out. Those Swedes deserve at least a women's handball victory.

I've had to make several hard choices like that.

How about Cuba vs. Venezuela in women's indoor volleyball? Which Latin American Socialist country should win that one? I imagine Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro would be OK with either team winning.

Or Japan vs. South Korea in women's singles table tennis?

A hard one. Japan, after all, has provided me with so much video gaming and listening pleasure over the years, not to mention driven me all over the United States.

Yet those South Koreans really did get screwed over by the Japanese during World War II and probably want this one more. I guess I was going for the South Koreans.

As a journalist, I don't pick favorites. But as a spectator, the strange loyalties form.  Bahrain versus Kenya in the men's 10,000-meter run? Australia versus Japan in women's softball?

-Jack Chang