The Grande Finale

I just finished coming from the most amazing Olympic experience here in Beijing. Watching the Beijing Olympic Closing Ceremonies with a couple hundred Canadians and then running outside to catch the closing fireworks at Tiananmen Square from what was, I kid you not, the best seat in the city (barring the officials directing traffic and overseeing the fireworks). We were a couple hundred metres from Tiananmen Square, watching from an elevated wooden deck. Access to the street below us was closed to pedestrians, and lined with hundreds of security forces.

The fireworks lasted a full 18 minutes and were an exercise in superb pyrotechnics which made the Celebration of Lights back in Vancouver look like a sparkler show. Every time it looked like the show was reaching its climax, it would take a step back from the edge and once again reach a crescendo. This would play over again and again, while high-tech fireworks dazzled - there were fireworks that exploded into red stars, others that made a cascading noise like waves crashing on the shore, and yet others that formed smiley faces. It was fun watching the buses, taxis and cars driving by Tiananmen that slowed down as they found themselves under a sky of explosions. The evening breeze blew the smoke away from our vantage point and we watched, along with local guards and PLA troops, as the show finally came to an amazing end.

I am no fireworks expert, but I am sure that any past fireworks display would have been hard-pressed to match the one I just saw. China went all out to bring its Olympic games to an unforgettable end. After the show, we all broke out in spontaneous applause, and the guards lining the street smiled at our gesture of appreciation, the look of pride on their faces barely hidden.

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