Add this fun fact to the list of #SochiProblems: the Sochi Winter Olympics has cost Russia $51 billion. 

Now, I understand that a billion dollars is kind of the new million –  at least it terms of how we comprehend the value of money in day-to-day conversation. If something costs millions of dollars, our mouths don’t usually drop – that news is merely *golf clap* worthy. 

The Sochi games are jaw-drop worthy. The International Business Times reported that the country is spending $51 billion on the Games. To put that into perspective, that’s $11 billion more than China spent on the 2008 Summer Olympics which had three times more events. And Canada, in 2010, spent just under $9 billion for the Winter Olympics.