No doubt I will be watching on television but whether I will stay awake through to the ceremony's end is doubtful. These ceremonies tend to be lengthy affairs. I've heard that the Australian team will be the third last team to enter the stadium. Given that, apart from Greece and the host nation, teams enter the stadium in alphabetical order I am curious as to the Chinese alphabet. Actually I didn't know they had an alphabet.
I had the pleasure to attend the Opening Ceremony of Sydney 2000. It is a thrilling feeling to attend a ceremony with your own country as the host nation. It was a windy and somewhat dusty evening for Sydney's ceremony which should give Beijing some heart with its current smog difficulties because thenceforth from Day 1 of competition onwards Sydney's weather was brilliantly sunny and summery. The opening pageant proved to be a great hit.
The entry of the nations followed and little did I realise how long, and frankly tedious, that could be. I still recall noticing from my watch the procession of nations had been underway for a full hour and we had only just reached 'M' in the alphabet. I don't recall now at what time the Australian flag bearer (Andrew Gaze, below) appeared in the Stadium leading Australia, the last team to enter, but our team was so large that it occupied almost the entire 400 metre track from start to finish before the last team member arrived.
In Sydney, the Opening Ceremony commenced at 8pm on the dot and I stayed to the end getting home at 3am. Yes, the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games is a marathon event all of its own.
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