This is the first Olympics at which athletes can compete under the flag of Kosovo, which proclaimed independence from Serbia in 2008. Douglas’s became the first African-American to win all-around gold during the London Olympics to lead the United States to the women’s team title.
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In a video preceding the show, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the games “celebrate the best of humanity” and appealed for an Olympic truce, calling on “all warring parties to lay down their weapons” during the two weeks of sporting achievement. When they sprout, they will be planted in a Rio park.
Once the athletes had entered the stadium, Brazil’s interim President Michel Temer declared open the games to jeers by some in the crowd of 60,000 spectators, a reflection of ongoing political repercussions from the impeachment proceedings against suspended President Dilma Rousseff.
Swimming legend Michael Phelps said the honor of being the US flag bearer was something that he could not pass up. At his fifth and last Olympics, it was the first time the record holder of 22 medals had marched in an opening ceremony, having skipped previous ones to save energy for competition.
The 271 Russian athletes – out of an original entry list of 389 – who walked into the stadium were only officially cleared to take part in the Games on Thursday.
The Rio planning committee hopes that this group will shed light on the world refugee crisis and make people from all nations and circumstances feel like they have a place at the Olympics, regardless of what’s happening in their home countries.
Armenia team participating with 32 athletes was lead by flag bearer swimmer Vahan Mkhitaryan. She was paralyzed in a auto accident as a teenager.
An estimated global audience of three billion watched the ceremony.
It was a largely nostalgic look at Brazilian history and what life looked like in the country before the Europeans settled – again pulled off elegantly and without the complicated and ambitious routines we’ve seen in previous opening ceremonies. Creative director Fernando Meirelles said their budget was slashed by half as Brazil’s economic recession bit ever harder. “It is not a good message for the world”.
“In the end I feel good that I am not spending money that Brazil hasn’t got”.
RIO DE JANEIRO-The Rio Games launched with a flamboyant spectacle headlined by supermodel Gisele Bundchen on Friday as a doom-laden Olympic build-up gave way to an energetic party atmosphere at the fabled Maracana stadium.
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The opening ceremonies this year were different, “more real”, some might say, in that the organizers of the event did not shy away from addressing controversial issues that have not only taken hold in Rio’s, but around the world.
