In Chinese class, we talked about things we will never forget and today was legitimately something I could never forget if I tried. But just in case, let me talk about it :)
We went to class in the morning and all I could think about was how big of a day it was. Kristyn said that in the morning she just sat straight up in bed and was like "its here!" I was the same way -- its like freaking Christmas morning. I bought a shirt that says 中国加油！ on it and wore it. Around 3pm we set off for the Bird's Nest, China's national stadium. The atmosphere in this city was ridiculous -- I don't think I can really put into words how excited everyone was -- it was literally impossible to walk five steps without hearing someone talking about the Olympics, someone wearing Olympic gear, or someone chanting "Zhongguo, Jiayou!" We got to the place we had staked out to sit (about 1/2 hour walk from the stadium)...and it was roped off. There were security guards EVERYWHERE and no one could get within view of the stadium. Nonetheless, there were hundreds of people there, just wanting to be around the Olympic hysteria. We decided to walk around and try and find another place to sit, but there was no hope. All the Chinese people around the area took pictures of the, well, white people in our group, and sold us "Zhongguo jiayou" headbands and Chinese national flags. We took some pictures and decided our best bet was to go to Wangfujing.
It took us an hour to get a cab. There were police everywhere, maybe every five feet, not to mention legit soldiers. We finally got to Wangfujing and it was pretty crowded. There were huge groups of Chinese people walking around, yelling "zhongguo, jiayou! Aoyun, jiayou! Beijing, jiayou!" or singing the national anthem and waving Chinese flags. But there were also a lot of foreigners -- Hungary, Poland, Mexico and Australia were particularly well represented. Anyway, we walked around and finally found the giant TV screen on which Opening Ceremonies was going to be shown. We sat down because we still had about an hour to go. The heat was, well, pretty typical and we drank some serious water. I'd estimate that there were about 200 people where we were sitting. Finally, with about 15 minutes to go, I stood up because my legs fell asleep. The ENTIRE street was full. Thousands of people had come while we were sitting down and couldn't see. I got chills. The jiayous had started again at this point and the sheer amount of people was unbelievable. KFC, which is on the second floor of the mall across from the screen has a full wall window. People were plastered to it from end to end. We cheered along with them for awhile.
Finally, we saw the screen turn from old footage of Hu Jintao meeting with foreign leaders (during which I'm pretty sure I heard people booing Putin) to live footage of the bird's nest. Everyone fucking went nuts, including us. We were screaming and jumping and jiayou-ing all over the place. It was amazing. They showed the inside of the bird's nest which had a countdown going on. Unfortunately, we didn't quite understand it was a countdown and thought it said "Go Go" instead of "60, 60". Therefore, when it got to "50, 50" Risa and I turned to each other and said "SO SO?!?!" and i thought "god they couldn't get a better translation for the fucking olympics?!" which really shows the translation quality in this country :) Anyway, We counted down from 10 and then all sorts of fireworks went off and it kind of hit me that this was the biggest moment in 1) recent Chinese history 2) some of these people's lives (at least as Chinese citizens). And I was there. Good lord it was amazing. I also just felt such happiness for the Chinese people that it was happening, that it was finally here. I think Kristyn's statement really sums it up: 'China! you DID it!! you DID it!'
The ceremony started with an enormous amount of drummers beating drums in the middle of the stadium. Their drums glowed, but then all the lights went off and just their sticks, glowing red in the darkness were visible. It was breathtaking, but a little scary. It was actually a good example of a lot of the ceremony: 15,000 performers took part and while it was an artistic triumph, I can't help but think that China might not understand that the rest of the world's main fear about them is that there are just SO. MANY. PEOPLE. and this performance did basically everything possible to remind everyone of that.
This beautiful little girl sang the national anthem, and everyone around us joined in, which was awesome. After that, there were many really cool dances and other sweet things (like people painting mountains by doing gymnastics or the people doing gongfu in a circle, protecting children learning in the middle). In the middle of the performance, the TV cut out to a commercial because their coverage messed up. Kristyn noted that at that moment, there was just a collective intake of breath -- what if something terrible had happened and they had to cut away from the ceremony. It was a moment of fear -- what if China's biggest fear actually just happened, though unlikely given the huge security precautions? But it didn't, and coverage came back. Big exhale. Then, the parade of nations started and we got to hear China's reaction to other countries. It was interesting also because the order was not alphabetical but rather by stroke order of the Chinese characters, and since we didn't know most of them, it was a surprise everytime a new country came out.
The Chinese cheered for everyone really, but if you were there supporting your country, and you cheered, they all got up, turned around, and cheered you. It was quite touching, really, they stood up and cheered for the Polish, Hungarians, Mexicans, and all the people at Wangfujing. Also, they cheered pretty loudly for Iraq, Russia and Iran. When Japan came out, some people cheered (about half as loud as usual) but then people started "shhhh!! shhh!!! anjing anjing (quiet!)" the others who were cheering. As the Japanese team rounded the track, "Zhongguo! Jiayou! Zhongguo Jiayou!" started louder than before. Really really interesting. The ladies sitting next to us asked where we were from (in Chinese) and I said "meiguo" so she said "when they come out you must cheer!" Well, we took THAT to heart.
After about an hour and a half of countries, the American team came out and we went completely insane. We were jumping and yelling and screaming U-S-A! U-S-A! and then started a "Meiguo! jiayou! Meiguo! Jiayou!" and everyone around us (all the Chinese people) joined in! Talk about hospitality. They were looking at us and waving and jumping for us. It was unbelievable. Then the camera showed George W. Bush. It got, and I am not exaggerating, significantly quieter. We got quieter. It was awkward. The camera went back and we went crazy again. It is interesting to me that his name is 'Bu shi.' which is the negation of the verb 'to be' (as in, to not be capable of much of anything, including eating pretzels). Anyway, we also noticed that the sheer amount of athletes on the American team took up an entire side of the stadium. The lady next to me said 'no wonder you win so many medals'
Then I was so dehydrated that I had to go home and we had to make our way out of the sea of people in Wangfujing. As we walked back down Nanluoguxiang to the hotel, I noticed that everyone, literally every establishment on our street had a TV and people were watching. It was like something you see in movies or in a textbook. We passed the laundromat and everyone who worked there was gathered around a TV in the back.
Finally, more fireworks went off and we were watching them out of the window in the 5th floor landing and out busts LaoLi, the owner of the hotel so that he could see them too. He was REALLY excited. We said "zhongguo jiayou!" to him and he answered "mianfei pijiu!" (free beer). We went out to the bar to hopefully see some Chinese people and see how excited they were but not too many were out. They had been encouraged to watch at home and it had been a really long day.
Now there's almost a feeling of "where do we go from here?" because 08/08/08 was what we had to look forward to. I am not super into the games themselves so Opening Ceremonies was the climax I guess. It was everything and more that we expected it to be, but I guess now its on to the medal count. :)
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