De Lima was a worthy replacement, but the absence of the most recognisable Brazilian sportsman on the planet was somehow fitting with the pared down nature of Rio’s opening night.
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The dominant images from the four-hour opening ceremony at the Maracana Stadium will be supermodel Giselle Bundchen’s catwalk across the pitch to “The Girl From Ipanema”, the joyous arrival of Brazil’s team and former marathon star Vanderlei de Lima lighting an Olympic cauldron that morphed into a golden disco ball.
Brazils interim President Michel Temer declared the opening of the games.
Temer took over when impeachment proceedings started against President Dilma Rousseff, whose supporters accuse him of plotting against the suspended leader.
And if you’re looking for your song of the summer, Team USA just released an Olympic-themed music video to Weezer’s song “I Love The USA” on its YouTube channel. The screen depicted rather morbid results about the potential damages of global warming to some of the world’s major cities. The crowd at Maracana Stadium roared as the men kissed.
According to early estimates, NBC’s full opening ceremony between 8 and 11:30 p.m. posted a 16.5 overnight household rating (which should come out to about 30 million viewers), compared to 23.0 during London 2012 (40 million viewers).
They were joined by a first-ever Refugee Olympic Team of 10 athletes, displaced from Syria, South Sudan, Congo and Ethiopia.
The 549-member US team was led by flag-holder Michael Phelps.
Team GB’s Andy Murray would appear to have some work to do in South America to match that pair’s appeal but the Scot waved the Union Flag with gusto and the British squad was given a warm reception.
Phelps will compete in the 200m butterfly, the 200m individual medley and the 100m butterfly in his fifth career Olympics.
The reasons for this were referenced in the main speeches of the night by the chairman of the Rio 2016 organising committee Carlos Nuzman and IOC president Bach.
The fireworks are over, the samba on temporary hold – and now it’s time for Olympic athletes to take center stage in Rio de Janeiro. Much of Rio’s population couldn’t even afford to attend.
There then followed the first ever awarding of an “Olympic laurel” to Kenyan running great Kip Keino, before the traditional unfurling of the Olympic Flag, rendition of the Olympic Anthem and recitation of Olympic oaths.
“The Olympics bring together the best athletes of the world peacefully, and they bring together hundreds of spectators, fans, officials and other ancillary personnel … in peaceful cooperation and a two-week long party”, adding, “We can never get along with our so-called enemies until we meet them, talk to them, get to know then and realize they are more like us than they are different from us”.
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Yet the giddy euphoria that invariably accompanies the opening of an Olympic Games has been notably absent as Brazil grapples with a tanking economy and a grim litany of social problems.
