Olympic Opening Ceremonies

We are watching. When they brought in the flag that flew over the World Trade Center and sang the National Anthem, I just lost it. I couldn't hold back the tears as it was so very moving.

We are watching, too.

it was just wonderful wasn't it??? got teary many times, mostly when our President was in the crowd with the kids, and when Kristi Yamagochi (sp) skated. Awesome show.

It was great!!!!!!The flag did it for me too.

Hmm.... They didn't even show it here, I think. Btw, our girls' PE teacher, Tiia Reima is in the Finnish Women Ice Hockey league.. :)

Yahoo, Jaakko Tallus jumped 101,5 metres in ski jumping.... went to the first place, haha =) Samppa lajunen jumped about 97 m..

This message was edited Saturday, Feb 9th 12:48 PM

I get very emotional whenever I see the flag, and last night was awesome, "the special" flag's entrance to the arena was soo touching, and did you notice the absolute complete silence? you could have heard a pin drop... (egads, getting weepy just writing this)

I was also touched by how many nations' atheletes waved the American flag alongside thier own national flag.

I was dissapointed that we couldnt see Turkey's entrance, because we were in commercial break :(

I was impressed that the Native American's were honored, (that got me boo hooing too...) and they put on such a spectacular performance, and the significance of their performance was touching (I often wonder if I am touched in the head for getting so emotional - must be age)
All in all it was

please no negative comments for what im about to say.
i come from a very strong, proud american military family. husband, father, biological father, brother, grandpa, even the ex husband, etc..
all my life ive been taught flag etiquette and that under no circumstances do you display a torn or tattered flag. when it becomes torn or dirty, you dispose of it in dignified way. i cant understand why this is so different. i have to say, the MAIN thing that i saw was that it was flying upside down..
my first impression of seeing a US flag torn, dirty and missing stars, flying upside down was that we are a broken country under distress.
what message are we giving the countries were fighting? shouldnt we be displaying a whole flag, right side up, that says "hey, were strong, were in 1 piece, weve overcome"?
furthermore, with a worldwide broadcast of the olympics, i dont think they needed to single out our country. its not fair to the other athletes. where will the olympics be in 2004? 2006? will that country be granted a moment of reflection that will possibly sway the judges? give sympathy?
i AM NOT blasting my country, i love her, i state, once again, that we are a strong american family, we fly our flag daily, and have flown our flag daily since the day we bought our house in 1997. i admit, i cried when they brought her out, but i dont feel that she should be displayed nor mourned. a torn flag does NOT need to be the symbol of our country, we need a whole and unblemished flag that shows the glory and strength that our country is known for.
i, myself, have not forgotten about 9/11. i hug my kids more, i take time for me, i take time to listen to others. i cry when i hear alan jacksons "where were you" on the radio and i smile every time i see the ribbon on daves.
we, as a country need to remember what america stands for and do our little part in making it a better place. more importantly, we need to carry 9/11 in our hearts, but we need the visuals that tell us our nation is still strong. we need to send messages to the other countries involved, were not split, were not under distress...were whole and were strong.
jen

I so agree, Jen! Since this wave of patriotism began, I have seen more inappropriate display of our flag than in my whole life before 9/11. For a number of years, I have wondered where the "flag police" are. USA flags are often flown lower than state and other flags, or soiled and tattered. I have observed young boys taking the flag down from a public pole, dropping it in a heap, laying it on the concrete to fold it. Some people who want to do the noble thing don't bother to become informed about flag traditions. It must not be taught in school any longer, but we had frequent instruction when I was in school. My Cub Scouts and Girl Scouts earned badges by knowing flag etiquette, and we practiced folding, raising and lowering a long time to get it perfect for their public display of what they learned. It may be, as one flag owner told me, "just a piece of cloth, lady, it ain't no sacred shroud." But it is a symbol, and if we don't care to treat it in a proper manner, we should leave the display to someone who takes the time to do it right. Or what is the point?

I can understand where you are coming from MSJen. My comments below are not meant to be negative, but only my feelings about the flag presentation.

I didn't take the presentation of the flag that flew over the WTT as disrespect for our country, or it's flag, at all. There were many new US Flags flown also. When this particular flag was brought in, I took it as a symbol saying to all that we had some troubling times recently, but we still persevere. We are United. We have been attacked and tattered, but we still, and always will... remain....United...Indivisible! There's no doubt in my mind that this particular flag will be taken care of properly in the end, but I feel that it's symbolism needs to remain around for a little while longer. It would be different to publicly display a flag that had been tattered in a wind storm or something similar, but to me, this flag has a significant symbolism attached to it, and I was very moved in seeing it displayed.

Olympics will be in AThens, Greece on 2004.

Wh yolympic can't be here. we have had them only once, and that was 1952, in poor Finland which just had gotten over of the war. We had to pay Russia and build there houses, and they said that we started the war. They took us Karelia, other "hand" of the Finland..... I saw only a little piece of the opening ceremonies in news, and the Finns... :/

BTW, we had to practice to fold the flags on 6th grade in school. :) Also we had to remember our national anthem words, and sing the Siniristilippumme (blue cross flag of ours).

This message was edited Sunday, Feb 10th 8:07 AM

You're right Ms. Jen, in all the patriotism ferver, flag etiquette has been ignored completely. I too thought the flag was upside down and wondered if there was a significance.
One thing I have noticed, Burger King has a huge flag flying in front of it, and for years, it was a torn and frayed, and it use to bother me, they have put up a new flag since 9/11.

There's a restaurant in Salt Lake City, that has an advertisement with Thanks in many languages. Of course it was wrote wrong in Finnish - Kitos, instead of Kiitos....

This was a discussion here the other night. Dh thought a new flag was in order, I thought it was a honor for this flag to be there.
I dont want to ever forget what happened and how many lives were affected.
I thought the opening ceremonies were very good.I had a hard time staying up for the torch to lite the caldron, but my lil night owl Dayme kept saying: "you watching" "are you sleeping?" So We both made it!
It was a wonderful ceremony.

pebble, a flag that is flown upside down signifies distress.
jen

Oh - I did not know that.

could it be because we are at war?

I also got choked up when the flag was brought in. I know it should be discarded properly, but I suspect if a tattered flag could have been brought up from any of our ships sunk at Pearl Harbor, our parents' generation would have wanted to see it on display, too. Was it too much patriotism for an international event? I don't know. I think every country that hosts it is entitled to a little "home town pride" in how the ceremonies are handled.

I thought they were very well done. I usually don't watch the entire opening ceremony of any of the Olympics (we're not telling how many I've been around for, LOL.) But I did watch this ceremony in its entirety. Best wishes to all the athletes and the countries they represent :)

Now you can all go and hate me but, I just think the IOC should enforce a rule that no political showing or statement be allowed in any Olympic Games opening/closing ceremonies. As bad as 9-11-01 was for our country any overtone to it did not belong in a international event like the Olympics. Even with us being the host country it is still the International Olympics not the United States Olympics. Just my opinion.

no hate felt here, tom!!

no hate felt, but Sept 11th was an international event.

By the way.... Theres a nice list of medals by country on the Salt Lake Olympics site: http://www.saltlake2002.com/x/f/frame.htm?u=/news/slocmain_front.asp

:)

Evert, want you to know, I've been pulling for the Finnish skiers and all!! Thinking of you:)

Thanks :) We have won 2 medals so far.. in Nordic Combined. Did you watch the medal giving thingie.... what it is called. Anyway - I did. It started on 5:00 AM. It is now Monday here and it's 6:49 AM. :)

By the way, they had an odd version of our national anthem, it was played much faster as it should have been. :/

Evert, I too was pulling for the Finnish athletes.

me too evert!

I must agree with MsJen as to the flag being flown. I believe that the US forgets that far greater evils have happened in other Countries. PLEASE this is my own personel thoughts on this and don't send me 500 emails telling me how wrong I am.

Honibee, You are right, far worse tragedies happen in other parts of the world all the time, but nothing of this magnitude has happend here.
Remember the Olympics of 72? I was in Munich right before the tragedy there. I remember after I returned home, listening to the radio with my friends, to all the details and not believing what was happening, (in those days there wasn't TV in Turkey) my group of friends (we were all young teens) were Italian, Jewish and Turks, and we all listened in stunned horror, the Jewish girls started crying and that got the rest of us boo hooeing....
It was raining outside, (not like the never ending rain here in the pacific northwest) and we all went out to walk in the rain - that day we all grew up a little bit, it was a milestone in our lives. The Jewish girls went on to enter the military in Israel 5 years after that incident(mandatory, and all the Jewish people in Turkey do their duty for 2 years) and I haven't heard from them since
Oh Brother!!! did I get off the subject or what? sorry...



This message was edited Monday, Feb 11th 1:05 PM