[Rhodes22-list] Olympics!

[Brad Haslett]

In case you missed the opening ceremonies, I'm including a blow-by-blow
summary by an Aussie blogger.  Here's a link to an article about the sailing
venue.


http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-08/07/content_9018901.htm

Qingdao is a beautiful city and attached is a photo of my niece from two
years ago on the Qingdao coast (with a really neat beer cooler).

Let the games begin!

Brad
 Tim Blair Friday, August 08, 2008 at 09:56pm


 9.57pm: All is in readiness. An air of anticipation fills Beijing's
National Stadium, replacing the need for any actual air.

10.00pm: It begins. The Chinese president celebrates by brazenly displaying
a plastic bottle of water. Doesn't he know how bad those things are for the
environment?

10.03pm: There are more drummers out there than in that old video clip for *
Tusk*.

10.05pm: Text from a pal: "Leni Riefenstahl, call your office!"

10.06pm: That's the first time I've seen a fireworks display in the shape of
pork chops.

10.08pm: Audio picks up Australian voices saying something about "moving
boxes back". This is possibly not part of the official broadcast.

10.10pm: The tiny child is *lip-syncing!* These Olympic Games are ruined for
me.

10.13pm: Utterly seamless ad break. Honestly, most viewers won't even have
noticed.

10.18pm: "An ode to paper!" texts another pal. "It gets better." A modern
dancer paints a picture of the sun, for the benefit of smog-shrouded
Beijingers who've never seen it.

10.21pm: The march of the featherheads continues. Now we see the world's
biggest keypad.

10.25pm: Those calligraphy monks have surrendered to the Giant Keyboard
without a fight. For shame.

10.26pm: Bigmac in comments: "Honey, why don't you stop and ask for
directions?" "Nonsense! This bamboo map is perfect!"

10.30pm: A refreshingly low-tech puppet show provokes laughter, for reasons
inexplicable due to the cultural divide.

10.32pm: A castrated Muslim admiral (!) finally receives his long-overdue
Olympic recognition.

10.35pm: The compass gets its moment to shine. Next: the set-square.

10.38pm: Nothing like a few bars of Peasant and Eastern music to get the
crowd hollerin'.

*• Fun Fact!* He doesn't mention it very often but Australian Prime Minister
Kevin Rudd can speak Mandarin, which is a kind of language they use in
China.

10.41pm: Now they're hailing China's invention of the vertical tube with
people on top of them.

10.43pm: China's Liberace—"I wish my brother Chong Yeng was here, instead of
in prison"—provides a piano lesson. Members of the minority Chinese neon
community are drawn to him.

10.47pm: The dove of peace never looks better than when it has a bullet
train speeding across it.

10.48pm: A Nikki Webster knock-off floats above the stadium as Liberace gets
so animated he almost knocks his little protege off her chair.

10.50pm: The deadly Chinese martial art of tai chi. Not to be confused with
the pleasant Indian drink, chai tea.

10.55pm: Global warming! The little children are chanting about it. I
suppose this means the end to any more Chinese coal-fired powerplants.
Commentator Ric Birch: "The children continue to paint in the hope the land
will turn green again and the birds will come back." Apparently, the
subsequent appearance of electronically-generated birds "reinforces the
message of the green games".

10.59pm: Chinese spacenauts herald the Great Dome's arrival. Birch wonders
if people on the Dome represent global population explosion.

11.01pm: Does that singer have the world's biggest neck or what? The guy,
that is. Not Sarah Brightman.

11.07pm: Spin, Mongols! Spin!

11.09pm: There are *athletes* involved in this?

*• Fun Fact!* In the Chinese alphabet, Australia starts with Z. So you won't
see any Australians until 3.00am or so.

11.12pm: Greece, Turkey, Turkmenistan, the Maldives ... and bagpipes.
Someone snuck some bagpipes in here.

11.14pm: Malta turns up and gets dissed for not winning a gold medal in 13
Olympic Games.

11.15pm: Best costumes thus far: Marshall Islands, on their Olympic debut.

11.18pm: Sandy Roberts: "When you think of Bhutan, you think of archery."

11.20pm: Worst costumes: the Belgians.

11.22pm: Happiest team: the Israelis.

11.23pm: The Japanese team arrives. "They have an interesting relationship
with China, over the years," muses Bruce McAvaney, "having invaded before
World War II."

11.29pm: Correction to the above: Uruguay is the happiest team. Drug-test
the two guys to the right of screen.

11.30pm: The Brazilians are wearing Gilligan hats. Impressively, one of the
Brazilians also had an old-school film camera.

11.33pm: McAvaney: "I'm excited about Panama."

11.35pm: How many Cubans are there? It's like Miami.

11.38pm: The Luxembourg team are dressed for job interviews.

11.42pm: Judges handing down life sentences look less serious than Chad's
pretty teenage flag-bearer. Take a lesson from the smilin' gal leading the
Nigerians.

*• Fun Fact!* The Beijing National Stadium holds 90,000 people, but this
will be reduced to 81,000 after the Olympics. And all the executions.

11.48pm: Missed the team, but that last flag-bearer who wandered through,
the 100kg guy, held his flagpole as though it were a toothpick.

11.51pm: McAvaney: "Wouldn't it be something if Nadal played Federer in the
final? That would give tennis the boost it really needs." Yes; finally,
tennis players might earn a living wage.

11.55pm: Six Iraqi athletes are here—and they won't be killed by Saddam
Hussein's sons if they lose.

11.57pm: The Hungarians have turned up following a paintball championship.

Midnight: WB in comments: "Bad uniform bilong Papua New Guinea." And from
Razor: "Babe of the night - Gold to Brazil."

12.13am: Many national leaders have been shown waving as their teams enter
the stadium. You know what that means when the Australians arrive ...

12.16am: Sarkozy welcomes the French. *Where's your wife?*

12.20am: Return of the bagpipes! Very appropriate, seeing as they piped in
... Kuwait.

12.25am: Putin barely acknowledges his own team's arrival. Possibly due to
horror at those shirts. Oh, NOW he stands up and waves.

12.27am: Americans wearing golf caps. Says McAvaney of GWB: "He's pretty
popular here." Apparently this is the first time a US President has appeared
at an Olympic opening ceremony outside of the US.

12.30am: BEST SHIRTS: Virgin Islands.

*• Fun Fact!* In topsy-turvy China, you find dissenters in landfill instead
of newspapers.

12.32am: The Zimbabwean team appears. Adjusted for homeland inflation, they
have a squad of twenty kabillion.

12.37am: "Algeria follows Saudi Arabia with the girls in skirts above the
knee," comments Saint. "Go Algeria."

12.39am: The poor Chinese dancers lining the parade route are visibly tired.


12.48am: Sri Lanka arrives. When they appeared under that name at Munich in
1972, a puzzled commentator is reported to have said: "'Sri Lanka' must be
West German for 'Ceylon'." Confusion over the name might be understandable,
but *West German*?

12.52am: Sandy Roberts just invented a new sport: "Juding". It's a cross
between judo and shooting.

12.55am: Someone in the crowd wolf-whistled the Swedes. UPDATE: The Mexican
team gets even more whistles.

12.57am: Hey ... where are the Tibetans?

12.58am: New Zealand's flag-bearer is wearing an elk pelt.

12.59am: New happiest flag-bearer: Italy.

1.00am: The moment of the Rudd Wave draws ever closer.

1.05am: More bagpipes. This time for notorious bagpipe nation Moldova.

1.06am: Big cheers for Australia, led by 42-year-old James Tomkins. The Rudd
wave is accomplished without injury.

1.09am: Chinese team arrives. Meanwhile, according to Bruce McAvaney, "the
Australian team is lapping it up—*literally!*"

1.12am: The Australians are wearing tracksuits that look like they were
designed for Ford racing pitcrews in the mid-90s. UPDATE: Infidel Tiger in
comments: "Australia! Representing Seaworld!"

1.16am: China's flag-bearer, who is more than seven feet tall, is being very
cautious and caring towards his tiny sub-teenage squad leader, making sure
he doesn't get hit by the flag and gently guiding him to where he should
walk. Nice.

1.19am: A drumming frenzy is underway. At least those bagpipes have been
silenced.

1.23am: "No man is an island," writes Irobot in comments. "Except for the
the flag bearer from Guam. What a unit."

1.24am: Fireworks—and *yet more* bagpipes. What's the deal? UPDATE: Junia in
comments: "I swear I have heard bagpipes playing 'Scotland the Brave' at
least 5 times."

1.26am: Judging by the music, we're either in for closing speeches or an *Iron
Chef* playoff.

1.45am: The 29th Olympiad begins.

1.55am: Oh, I forgot the small matter of lighting the Olympic flame. A man
of stout form carries the torch.

1.57am: Torch still carried.

1.58am: Now there are two torches and torch-carriers.

2.00am: A female athlete carrying the torch advances towards ... where?

2.01am: Another handover. Big man now has the torch. And he's ... *flying!*

2.02am: *He's performing an airborne lap of the entire freakin'
stadium!*Watch him go!

2.04am: He hovers. He ponders. He *lights it*. The Olympic flame—more of an
Olympic furnace—is ignited.

2.06am: Holey moley.
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