Olympic Poll #3: The Ceremony

What was the most impressive thing about Beijing Olympic Opening Ceremonies?

Choice 1: the "Bird's Nest" stadium as well as the other new buildings/venues
Choice 2: Everything about the show, from the fireworks to the number of performers
Choice 3: the size of balls it took to inject an international sporting event with (not so) subtle militarization
Choice 4: Nothing, I boycotted it, as I will the whole 2 weeks of the Games
Choice 5: Other (please elaborate in reply)

Olympic Poll #1: Opening Ceremonies Commercials

Olympic Poll #2: Opening Ceremonies Commentary

all peoples as an ideal gathered together as one.

The folks from Cameroon- they were as proud to be the way they are (and they looked good) as anyone, even though they might never win a medal.

One planet/one peoples. We have a long way to go- but never discount symbolism.

For our children face challenges far beyond what we the privileged and entitled born and raised in America have.

May we live in interesting times....

~Depa

I was impressed with the Palestinian guy though.

And I liked the Aussies second to last entrance (PM Kevin Rudd speaks fluent Mandarin).

...there are actually 3 countries with only one participant:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Togo_at_the_2008_Summer_Olympics">Togo, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grenada_at_the_2008_Summer_Olympics">Grenada and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nauru_at_the_2008_Summer_Olympics">Nauru

All the countries can be found http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Summer_Olympics#Participating_NOCs">here

It was a fantastic event.

Is fucking NBC ever going to post the entire thing on the web for viewing, or what?

:D

Olympics on NBC, CNBC and MSNBC.

And watching it in High-Def was a very good time.

It was fantastic.

Blinkers and/or making like an ostrich does not a wise man make.

they should retire the opening ceremonies trophy was spot on . . . say what you will about the Chinese, they put on one hell of a show . . .

as I'm pro-Taiwan independence (as an American, I can't help but see some parallels between Taiwan and America in its founding days) and anti-Communist Party. Some of the messed up shit that America's done under Bush I see as being encouraged by a China willing to aid and abet in Bushco's criminal enterprises. I mean shit, Ugyurs are being tortured in Gitmo and some of the interrogation techniques like water-boarding were directly inspired by Chinese interrogation practices.

Also, I have to note that English is very imprecise in this regard when it comes to the various connotations of the word "Chinese." Here, I am using Chinese in the political sense of the word, as in 'of China.' But when Chinese is used as an ethnic describer, I see it as bothersome that China's current "one China" policy and their disturbing tendency for revisionist history means that their attempt at fusing the political and ethnic meanings of "Chinese" gives them an illogical justification to attempt to build a Chinese empire. Note their possessiveness of anyone who possesses any Chinese ethnicity or countries that have been influenced by China like Korea (don't make me go on about their arguments with Korean historians over whether or not the kingdom of Goguryeo held actual territories in present day China and what that implies politically).