Letters from China No 12

7^th September 2008

I don’t know if it was broadcast or “fed” to the networks, but last night we watched the opening ceremony for the Paralympics in Beijing on TV. Not quite the spectacle of the “other” Olympics, but wonderful in its own right and a very fitting tribute to disabled people throughout the world. The initial countdown to the beginning was done by several children from different nationalities holding up a book and opening it to show the remaining seconds. The last ten seconds were counted down by fireworks which burst into the numbers themselves. I believe only the Chinese could devise fireworks like that, just as they created the Olympic circles at the other ceremony.

The stadium was full as the ceremony started with what looked like 3 or 4,000 jelly babies in different colours dancing about. They were actually meant to be cartoon representations of athletes. They were quickly followed by the athletes and their various officials.

Then the real show began with the Sunbird descending from a large sun to a visually impaired singer who sang in both Chinese and English. Several other disabled performers took centre stage as the whole show moved towards the finale of a man in a wheelchair hoisting himself and chair to the rim of the stadium and lighting the Paralympic Flame.

Perhaps attitudes here will change towards the disabled, of whom there are 83 million in both the cities and countryside. They have been, and still are, heavily discriminated against, but official attitudes are changing although not yet at grass-roots level. At least in officialdom they have stopped referring to the disabled as “canfei” roughly translated as “useless cripple” and are now using the word “canji” which means “physically disabled”. We’ll see what transpires.

Overall the ceremony was a much more human show and showed the government’s desire to encompass the disabled into society, which can only be a very good thing…..