[big]T[/big]he rest of the world cannot come close to China when it comes to pomp and circumstance at public events. And the Sports Days that take place in every school around the country this time of year are the crowning glories. Our day at Maple Leaf earlier this week followed the usual pattern.
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Thursday afternoon, we had the opening ceremony rehearsal. Every homeroom got to parade around the track, stop and do a small presentation in front of the audience in the stands (the Chinese and English principal), followed by the teachers walking (I would like to say marching but that would be a lie). There were flags, marching (everyone except the teachers marched in unison), music, banners, and sometimes different matching (hmm..different matching, interesting) outfits for the groups of students. The next day we got to do it all over again for the actual event.
Of course on the big day, along with the marches, etc, there were copious speeches encouraging the “athletes” and praising the virtues of keeping fit. Marching along gave us a taste of what it must be like in the Olympic opening ceremonies minus anybody watching from the stands. This year it was drilled into us that we must remain impartial at all times during the judging. I guess there must have been some “incidents” last year. As part of the opening ceremony, we had a Tae Kwon Do demonstration by a group of students and a short fan dancing routine by another. Not the kind of fan dancing that comes to mind when you picture it in North America!
And then the sports began. Mixed in with the running, shot put, and long jump there were also big-time competitions such as the three-legged race, kangaroo jump, and bottle race. I got to time the traditional races all morning so learned words such as “di yi” and “di er” (1st place and 2nd place”, etc and yelled “jia you” (pronounced “yo” ) along with everyone else to the runners as they passed to cheer them on, the direct translation which is “add oil”. lol
The day ended with yet another ceremony with awards presentations, more ceremonial music, more speeches, and more marching. Yep, flag raising, speeches, marching, and military music pretty much sum up any official ceremony. Although the tune they often play while handing out awards is from an old western movie that I don’t remember the name of…go figure!
Still great weather with a temperature of 25 Celsius and…”hazy”…skies as you can see in the photos. Let’s just say that China is one country where you can often look directly at the sun without any eye protection.
Only in China could you find more than two people tied together and manage to figure out how to run like that! Looks like great fun to me.