Opening Ceremony Tai Chi Performers Angry

I admit I was blown away by last Friday's opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games.

The precision of thousands of Tai Chi performers was amazing.

It was spectacular, absolutely incredible to watch.

It turns out, however, that it wasn't a good experience for the performers.

From Norway's Aftenposten:

The Kung Fu pupils in the opening ceremony of the Olympics have spent the last year cooped up in a military camp outside Beijing. Conditions have been bad. "They weren't even given enough food," says their trainer. This news adds to the criticism of the Beijing Organizing Committee.

Viewers from around the globe marvelled at the Opening Ceremony last Friday. One of the most spectacular features was the martial arts display by 2008 pupils from the famous Shaolin Centre in Henan province. With coordinated movements, they showed the Tai Chi variant of Kung Fu; a popular way to relax for many Chinese people.

The skilful and well-executed show took a severe toll on many of the participants; both those who took part and the performers who were held in reserve.

Many of the martial arts performers feel abused and ignored by the Olympic organizers. For the last year, they have been housed 50 to a room, more than 70 kilometres from the ‘Bird’s Nest’ National arena. This is where they have slept, eaten and spent all their time.

Leaving the compound around the barracks was strictly forbidden. The dormitories are crammed with bunk beds. Between 30 and 50 of the teenagers spent the night in each room. Only a few of the showers work and the toilet facilities have been bad. The winter was icy and in summer, the pupils had to battle against mosquitoes and the heat.

"After repeated complaints they finally installed air-conditioning in the sleeping quarters. However, most of the equipment was so old that it didn't work," says one of the pupils.

Most of the 2500 performers have been sent home after the opening ceremony. The few that remain in order to take part in the closing ceremony are extremely angry about the treatment they have received from the Olympic organizers.

"The food is the worst thing. We’ve had the same two courses for dinner for a year. Sometimes there hasn't been enough for everyone. Those who have arrived last haven't got anything to eat," says a pupil.

He adds that he "wants to throw up," when the food is served.

"We never get noodles or dumplings. All we get is rice," he says.

...Conditions have been so bad that their trainer, Kung Fu master Liu Haike, has sent a series of complaints to the Olympic organizers. The complaints did have some effect.

"In the end, the pupils got enough to eat, even if the diet was extremely monotonous," he says to daily newspaper Aftenposten.

Liu describes pressure from the organizers as extreme. Everything had to be perfect. As result the performers had to practice up to 16 hours a day. "The test performance of the opening ceremony was worst of all. The pupils had to remain in the stadium for 51 hours. They were hardly fed. There was nowhere to sleep. Some managed to sleep on the seats, but they didn't get more than a couple of hours at most," says Liu.

He adds that several of the pupils got heatstroke, but their physical training meant that they got better again relatively quickly. Liu says that he felt very sorry for his pupils and the way that they were treated.

"But the organizers have promised them an Olympic certificate thanking them for their effort. They will not receive pay. Nevertheless I think that the majority will think that it was good to do what they did for the Olympics and their country," says Liu.

That's shocking!

If I knew last Friday what I know now, I would not have spoken so glowingly about the opening ceremony.

These performers were treated like prisoners! What a disgrace!

Another instance of China's abuse of the opening ceremony participants:

Soldiers operating the huge scroll that formed the centrepiece of last week's Olympic opening ceremony had to stay hidden under the structure for up to seven hours, wearing nappies because they were not allowed toilet breaks.

Nearly 900 soldiers were hidden underneath the scroll, many of them moving giant printing blocks with Chinese characters, the Beijing News reported Friday.

"The performers for Chinese character parts went into the models underground at 2 p.m., and after getting in there they could not come out," the newspaper quoted choreographer Han Lixun as saying.

"The underground area was so hot, there were 897 people there, and they had to wait until they finished their performance," Han said.

"So altogether they had to stay there for six to seven hours, and they could not even go to the toilet, so they all wore nappies," Han said.

Asked by the newspaper why the soldiers had to be in place so early, Han said it was because of the complexity of getting all the performers into position before spectators began entering the 91,000-seat Bird's Nest Olympic stadium.

That's horrible!

It's torture.

My opinion of the opening ceremony has completely changed. I cannot consider it the most breath-taking event ever staged by a host city of the Olympics.

What the Chinese did to its citizens to achieve the grandeur of the ceremony is inexcusable.

It's so sad. What seemed like a crowning achievement of great beauty was achieved through methods that violated basic human rights.


(h/t Mark Levin)

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