HONG KONG - This time, the handover went the other way.
In a rousing closing ceremony for the XXIX Olympiad on Sunday night - a grand
and joyous party at Beijing's "Bird's Nest" National Stadium that seemed as
much a celebration of China's rising star on the world stage as it was a
capstone to 17 days of athletic achievement - the Olympic flag was passed to
London Mayor Boris Johnson, whose city will host the 2012 Games.
Johnson has said he and his country are "not intimidated" by the magnificent
scale and success of the Beijing Games, and the eight-minute handover
performance featuring soccer icon footballer David Beckham, Led Zeppelin
guitarist Jimmy Page and London-born pop singer Leona Lewis was promising
enough.
Still, it will be hard to match this Olympic show, which opened
and closed so masterfully under the direction of China's most renowned
filmmaker Zhang Yimou. The venues built for the Games have provided
state-of-the-art settings for brilliant athletes such as American swimmer
Michael Phelps, Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt and China's nonpareil group of
divers and table tennis players; indeed, the National Stadium and the "Water
Cube" National Aquatics Center stand as iconic monuments to these Games.
Hong Kong made its own proud contribution to the Olympics, receiving all-around
rave reviews for its staging of the equestrian events.
In the end, Chinese athletes took full advantage of their status as hosts of
these Games. China won more gold medals, 51, than any other country and, in
bagging 100 medals overall, was second only to the United States in the total
medal count. And while the world's best athletes were showcasing their talents
in first-rate facilities, Chinese security forces kept terrorism at bay.
Finally, even Beijing's notorious air pollution cleared, as Chinese officials
had promised and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had prayed, and blue
skies prevailed.
By any standards, the Beijing Olympics was a triumph for China. Why, then, has
there been so much carping about the Games in the Western media? For every
story about the success of Chinese athletes or the grand vision and artistic
prowess on display in the opening and closing ceremonies, it seems there is
another one on the oppressive authoritarianism of the Chinese government or
Beijing's broken promises on allowing protests and greater media freedom. Is
all this so much sour grapes from Western powers frightened and jealous of
China's increasing international clout?
Some critics have even likened the Beijing Olympics to the 1936 Games held in
Berlin to legitimize Nazi rule of Germany. While such a comparison is
maliciously wide of the mark, the flood of commentary on this summer's Games
has once again served to illustrate the enormous perception gap between China
and the West. For the Chinese, there is something potentially sinister in the
stubborn refusal among China-bashers to recognize the tremendous progress the
country has made - not just on economic issues but socially and politically as
well.
There was, however, a dark side to these Games. It was mostly hidden and
unseen, but that only made its presence more disturbing. At times, the Chinese
security apparatus showed its true colors - for example, when police manhandled
journalists trying to cover the rowdy crowds lining up to buy tickets prior to
the opening of the Games, wrongly detaining a photographer working for Hong
Kong's South China Morning Post. Two Japanese reporters were also beaten and
detained in China's western Xinjiang autonomous region while covering an
apparent terrorist attack on a remote police outpost that left 16 people dead.
No doubt with the imminent opening of the Games in mind, local authorities
apologized to the Japanese reporters and pledged to pay any medical bills that
they incur.
For a true picture of China's still-woeful record on media freedom, go to the
Foreign Correspondents' Club of China website.
There are more than 300 complaints posted there since January 1, 2007,
detailing official harassment of journalists who were simply trying to do their
job. Such complaints continued into the Olympics when reporters at the Olympic
press center discovered that their Internet access had been restricted.
And where were all the protestors, both foreign and domestic, at these Games?
Given all the anti-China demonstrations overseas leading up to the Games -
protests over everything from Beijing's crackdown in Tibet to its exportation
of faulty, sometimes lethal products - there was once speculation that this
summer's Olympics could be remembered as the "Protest Games". Over the last
several years, thousands of "mass incidents" - the official euphemism for
demonstrations, often violent, by aggrieved Chinese citizens - also fueled this
speculation.
Following the lead of Sydney in 2000 and Athens in 2004, the Chinese even
established official protest zones in three parks in Beijing. Once the Games
actually began, however, there was scarcely a demonstrator to be seen. No
applications for protests were approved, and the three parks have turned into
recreation havens for the elderly and families with young children.
At least two elderly women were persona non grata in these parks,
however. Neighbors Wu Dianyuan, 79, and Wang Xiuying, 77 - who applied for a
protest permit because their homes in central Beijing were demolished seven
years ago to help make way for the stunning Olympic infrastructure that is now
the admiration of the world - have been sentenced to a year of re-education
through labor for their efforts.
Grannies in labor camps? This news is not going to be well received in any part
of the world and is certainly not the kind of image the Chinese leadership
wanted to have associated with their grand coming-out party. Surely, it will be
reversed - and the sooner, the better.
The few protests that did occur during the Olympics were directed by foreigners
who had come to Beijing under the guise of sports fans, but those
demonstrations were quickly snuffed out and their perpetrators detained. The
reason there were not a lot more of them is now an open secret. Beijing was so
stingy about granting visas ahead of the Games that many hotels in the capital
were half empty while at the same time billions of television viewers tuned in
to watch China's big moment in the sun. Indeed, the relative dearth of
foreigners at these Games marks them as the least international in character in
recent memory.
Aside from these complaints, Chinese leaders are also probably smarting over
allegations of cheating (in gymnastics) and proof of fakery (in the otherwise
flawless opening ceremony). But here, too, the perception gap looms large.
Some of China's gold-medal-winning female gymnasts do look awfully young, and
state media had just a year ago reported the age of one of them, He Kexin, as
13. But that has all changed now. Birth certificates, passports and other
documents show that all members of the team will be at least 16 years old this
year, as required by Olympic rules. That ends the debate as far as Chinese
Olympic officials are concerned, but an unsatisfied International Federation of
Gymnasts has asked for further clarification and senior members of the IOC have
also expressed doubt.
In the knock-out opening ceremony, the fireworks that began it all - those
distinctive "footprints" in the sky leading to the National Stadium - turned
out to be computer-generated. Then it was revealed that Lin Miaoke, the
adorable nine-year-old girl who captivated the world with her performance of a
song titled Ode to the Motherland, was actually lip-synching to the
beautiful voice of seven-year-old Yang Peiyi, who had been judged too
unattractive to be seen.
While the Lin Miaoke controversy stirred up some lively discussion in Internet
chat rooms among China's growing band of Internet users, for the most part the
use of such skillful artifice in the national interest is a no-brainer to the
Chinese. To China's critics, however, these deceptions are reminders that the
country is untrustworthy and not yet ready for the leading role it aspires to
on the world stage.
In Western eyes, then, China's promises of greater honesty, tolerance and
openness ring hollow as the Games end. For many Chinese, however, Beijing has
done well to compromise but not capitulate to Western demands; such
capitulation would be seen as not only humiliating but also destabilizing in a
country still struggling to balance social equity with torrid economic growth.
As the blaze of fireworks, the extraordinary athletic achievements and the
predictable controversies fade into memory, it is important to give Beijing its
due. The Beijing Olympics has been a grand success and an important symbol of
the progress China has made as a rising nation, progress that should be
recognized, encouraged and applauded.
In comparative terms, China, despite its many flaws, has never been more free
and open, and this ongoing but gradual process may - indeed, should - be
accelerated by its hosting of the Games. We can only wait, hope and see.
Kent Ewing is a teacher and writer at Hong Kong International School. He
can be reached at kewing@hkis.edu.hk.
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