Opening
The Olympic opening ceremonies represent the official commencement of an Olympic Games. In recent Olympics, athletic competition began prior to the opening ceremonies. For example, the football competitions for both men and women at the 2008 Summer Olympics began two days prior (August 6) to the opening ceremonies. As mandated by the Olympic Charter, various elements frame the Opening Ceremonies of a celebration of the Olympic Games. Most of these rituals were canonized at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium.
Read more about this topic: Olympic Games Ceremony
Famous quotes containing the word opening:
“With two sons born eighteen months apart, I operated mainly on automatic pilot through the ceaseless activity of their early childhood. I remember opening the refrigerator late one night and finding a roll of aluminum foil next to a pair of small red tennies. Certain that I was responsible for the refrigerated shoes, I quickly closed the door and ran upstairs to make sure I had put the babies in their cribs instead of the linen closet.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)
“Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise.”
—Bible: Hebrew Proverbs, 6:6.
The words were rendered by Samuel Johnson in the opening lines of The Ant: “Turn on the prudent ant thy heedful eyes, Observe her labours, sluggard, and be wise.”
“The busy tribes of flesh and blood,
With all their lives and cares,
Are carried downwards by thy flood,
And lost in following years.
Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.”
—Isaac Watts (1674–1748)