Bah.
At least the Chinese have pride and soul.
Awesome. There are not enough superlatives to cover the dazzling spectacle that is the 2008 Olympics Opening Ceremony in Beijing. I'm sitting here in Los Angeles watching a 10-hour delay of the broadcast on NBC(HD). The majority of the countries' athletes have paraded in. The US athletes just walked into the Bird's Nest with their dapper Ralph Lauren blazers and their crisp white Kangol-style paperboy hats. They all looked darling, the girls looked especially cute in the garb.
The first two hours of the pageant was pure mind-blowing eye candy. Kudos to Chinese director Zhang Yimou and China for sparing no expense. So amazing, I haven't seen anything like this in a while. An impressive spectacle that's enveloped with symbolism, contrasting themes of soft, graceful beauty and the hardness of the presence of militaristic elements. There is the commingling of lo-tech/hi-tech with the intricate choreography. I'll remember the giant LED scroll, the 15,000 performers in total, the cute Chinese kids, the 2,008 Chinese men doing tai-chi in a perfect cocentric circle, the giant globe with performers running around it like a Dali-esque dream, the wraparound projection scrim atop the rim of the Bird's Nest, humble 7'-6" Yao Ming carrying his Chinese flag, flanked by the adorable 9-year old boy who saved his two classmates in the earthquake in Suchuan. I'll remember the Chinese block field undulating in perfect unison like an animatronic screen by Decoi, then seeing the tops pop of these Chinese blocks like a jack-in-the-box and revealing the hundreds of people operating this field and not some computer.
Difference, sameness, hope and passion, it's all there. The endless stream of happy faces, it is pure, concentrated joy. What a magical, artistic, cultural statement. Yeah, I shed a tear. Cool stuff.
Let the games begin.
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