Beijing Olympics Opening

[NaperVic]

The opening Ceremony was fantastic. I loved it.

 

I did too! Some observations...

 

1) I couldn't help but notice that most of the displays were made up of lots of individuals coming together acting as one (the drummers, the ink blockers, the lighted guys, etc). As individuals, they're pretty ordinary, but when acting in unison, it was amazing.

 

The 'collective' acting in harmony was very apparent. I'm probably generalizing here, but it seems in the U.S., we seem to focus more on the talent of individuals.

 

2) The children dressed in the traditional dress to represent all of the ethnic groups of China carrying the flag - If it were in the US, they probably would have gotten real representatives from each of those ethnic groups to march instead of using local Beijing-ers playing the part. While the dress was different for each of the children, their physical features all looked the same.

 

3) The military involvement and the 'tribal' drumming felt like they were also trying to show their growning strength.

Edited August 9, 2008 by NaperVic

[LittleBuddhaTW]

It wasn't much different than the Arirang festival in North Korea.

 

There's an old saying in Chinese, "Even when you take a cow to Beijing, it's still a cow." (niu qian dao beijing, haishi niu) In other words, a leopard never changes its spots -- or, to be more clear, Communist China can throw around all the money and pomp it wants, but underneath, the regime, at heart, is no better than North Korea. It was a huge mistake to give the Chinese government the legitimacy that the Olympics brings. I've lived there and saw the repressive regime first hand, hence the reason I decided to live long-term in Taiwan instead of China.

 

Peace,

LB

[Phantom]

I really can't wait to see more of the swimming... I even set up my home page as the swimming time sheet for the olympics lol

 

Also: This thread is really getting political in nature... if we wanna talk politics, lets start a forum in the soapbox instead of discussing it in the lounge... If you wanna talk about it, you can click this link and go to the soapbox: China hosting the 2008 Olympics

[JSmith]

Just to reiterate what Eric said, this thread is for the Olymics Opening Discussion only. All Chinese Government discussion should be taken to the Soapbox.