2015-04-01
486
The opening ceremony held in the Beijing National Stadium on August 8, 2008. The number 8 is associated with prosperity and confidence in Chinese culture, and here it was a triple eight for the date and one extra for time (close to 08:08:08 pm). The ceremony featured a cast over 15, 000 performers, and was named “the most spectacular Olympics Opening Ceremony ever produced”.
The Beijing Olympics have come to a close after 16 days of thrilling competition – with the home nation sat on top of the gold medal table. China has spent seven years planning for this event. It must be said that these Olympics are being held as both a sporting and an operational success. Worries about air pollution, protests and media freedom were eventually overshadowed by what went on in the sporting arenas.
At the closing ceremony the International Olympic Committiee President, Jacque Rogge, said they had been “truly exeptional games”.
10, 500 athletes competed in over 302 events, and China and the United States sent the largest teams (639 and 596, respectively). In some cases, countries were represented by only a single athlete, and Tuvalu, Montenegro and the Marshall Islands all competed for the first time.
There was one event more than Athens, with 165 men`s events being held to 127 women`s events and 10 mixed. Nine new Olympic events were held, including two from the new BMX cycling category. For the first time, women competed in the 3000 meter steeplechase, and longer swimming events were offered for both men and women. In table tennis, the doubles event was replaced with team events. In fencing, the men`s team foil and women`s team epee were replaced with the women`s team foil and women`s team sabre.
43 new world records were set during the 2008 Summer Olympics, and 132 Olympic records were also set. In all, 87 countries won medals during the game, and the Chinese led the pack with the most gold medals.
|
|
|
American swimmer Michael Phelps won eight gold medals, setting the record for the most gold medals won in one Olympics. He also has more gold medals than any other competitor in Olympic history. New records were also set in the 100m and 200m dash.
The ceremony to mark the end of the games, held in the Bird`s Nest stadium on August 24, 2008, borrowed some of the grand style of the opening ceremony. Hundreds of performers were deployed in dazzling sequences that took months of planning to execute to perfection. And this being China, there were more fireworks.
The Olympics is being seen as a success from the government all the way down to ordinary people on the streets.
“The best of the best – ever”, said one compere, referring to this particular Games a few minutes before the closing ceremony started.
The closing ceremony s partly about hanging over to the next host of the Summer Games, which in 2012 will be London.
That gave the British capital the chance to stage its own mini-show within closing ceremony. It began when the Olympic flag was handed to recently elected London Mayor Boris Johnson, who seemed to fumble to unfurl the banner before holding it aloft.
A red London bus than entered the stadium, out of which singer Leona Lewis and guitarist Jimmy Page, who together performed the rock classic “Whole Lotta Love”.
Notes:
· BMX — кросс на велосипеде
· to lead the pack - лидировать
· dash - заплыв
· to deploy - развертывать
· dazzling - ослепительный
· sequence - эпизод
· to hand over — передавать полномочия
· to fumble — неумело обращаться
· unfurl - развертывать
· aloft — в воздухе
