London Olympic Games Opening Ceremony

The London Olympic games have started.

I got up bright and early to watch the live broadcast of the opening ceremony on TV. I was intrigued to the fantastic show, which James Bond, Mr. Bean and Paul MacCartney appeared.

In the last Olympic Games, China showed their 4,000 years of history by featuring their great inventions, such as paper, printing, a compass． Then, how about in London？　Danny Boyle, a filmmaker and the general director for the ceremony, selected these things as theme for the show: capitalists and laborers, immigrants and social security. They are the selection that I hardly come up with when I think of what England is like.

The images of United Kingdom that most Japanese commonly perceive are, maybe, gentlemen, high tea, gardening, liberty prints, Burberry and such. However, there were no such hi-society things in the show. Danny Boyle seemed to prefer bitter reality to sweet glories.

The New York times introduced a comment from Aiden Burley, a Conservative member of the Parliament, in its article “A Five-Ring Opening Circus, Weirdly and Unabashedly British.” It says: the most leftie opening ceremony I have ever seen — more than Beijing, the capital of a communist state!

NYT also added; The ceremony seemed to be suggesting that the thing that is most British about the British is their anarchic spirit and their ability to laugh at themselves. The show has made me aware of another aspect of England and it’s more interesting to me than watching competitions, in which Japanese athletes are totally dull.

photos: The New York Times

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