Opening Ceremonies

I'm not one for the Olympics--winter or summer. I understand why so many people are, in a prepackaged display of patriotism and oversimplified notions of identity. My husband, Lars, is the consummate athlete--he teaches phys ed, competes in triathlons,wakes up at 5:00 am to coach swimming, participates in the Ride to Conquer Cancer--and so he will likely call in "sick" during some of the most exciting events over the next two-and-a-half weeks. I will likely not bump into him anywhere around the house except in front of the TV; and I will likely not hear a word uttered from him, except, by chance, during a commercial break as he finds a moment or two to summarize the day's highlights.

Anyway, I begrudgingly agreed to watch the Opening Ceremonies with him.

The night began with an homage to our First Nations and aboriginal peoples, introducing the four cardinal points care of the white buffalo, the eagle, the great wolf, and the bear; this was followed by a separation of ice and snow, which we interpreted as a subliminal message about global warming, and anxiously awaited a shirtless Al Gore who would emerge from centre stage weeping, cradling a freshly slaughtered seal pup in his arms.

A majority of the ceremony focused on Canada's distinct and diverse native populations; however, I wonder whether this might come as an insult to people who are so thoroughly neglected, relegated to the periphery of Canadian society as if a distant memory or simply a nuisance? I guess it just feels exploitative, or hypocritical at the very least, to pretend to respect and admire the uniqueness and beauty of peoples in front of a global audience when, unfortunately, I just don't believe that is the case for the majority of our politicians or our population during the other (non-Olympic) forty-nine-and-a-half weeks of the year.

Lars reminds me that I am a cynic; I remind him that if I feel forced to sit through a hyperbolic spectacle of pomp and circumstance, that I will at least find some kind of critical avenue through which to enjoy it.

Besides the aforementioned First Nations hypocrisy, I found it ironic that the performance displaying the theme of nature's transformative power on Canada's artistic community was danced by the Alberta Ballet Company, an organization belonging to our most conservative province, whose Culture Minister Lindsay Blackett, just last week, announced that all Albertan arts groups must brace for a 10-15% cut to their funding.

Then out came a series of fiddlers who looked oddly like pirates or the London cast of "We Will Rock You." Or perhaps Johnny Rotten-meets-William Wallace.

But then: the incomparable lameness of Nelly Furtado's and Bryan Adams' song that cheerily encouraged our athletes to "jump a little higher...so the whole world can hear..."

The ceremonies could have been shortened by approximately one hour. The novelty of seeing a Peter Pan-esque adrogenous adolescent boy awkwardly run-fly through the prairies, or a dozen wannabe Cirque du Soleil performers dressed as snowboarders and skiers suspended from a flowing fabric mountain range wears off within a minute or two, tops.

Maybe I'm just bitter because in light of celebrating Canada's diversity and her aboriginal roots, White Anglo-Saxxons and Francophones were so grossly underrepresented--except by the athletes, of course. And the politicians. And the sea of upper middle-class spectators who could afford thousand dollar tickets. And the CEO of the Olympic organizing committee. And every single one of the eight Olympic flag bearers and all five of the final torch bearers/cauldron lighters. And the elephant of imperialism, domination and oppression lingering in the room. At least the spoken word poet was good--oh, and very, very white.