Vancouver Olympics Opening Ceremony

As memories of the Beijing Olympic Games fade to memory, I have to admit their opening and closing ceremonies were pretty good. Naturally, ones’ thoughts turn to “What are WE going to do?”

Inside sources indicate that instead of having a single guy run around the edge of the stadium like the Chinese did, our BC Place will be re-shaped into a huge Tim Horton’s cup and the entire crowd will get to roll up the rim. The world will win a donut.

This will be accompanied by an innovative government-sponsored multi-cultural extravaganza of dancers flitting about the field singing maple syrup-themed native music performed by Mountie fiddlers from Cape Breton, Anne Murray conducting.

Dignitaries will then enter the field - Gordon Campbell on the right, Prime Minister Stephen Harper negotiating the centre, and Stephane Dion, slightly left of centre and carrying English subtitles of his English translations, will be one step behind the Prime Minister. Note: this portion of the ceremony may change.

The President of the United States (and Mr. Palin) should be in attendance, although it is unclear if Secret Service helicopter gunships will be able to maneuver inside the stadium as they circle to prevent terrorist attacks. Plan on them circling to the left. The gunships that is.

Former President Bush will also attend, with contingency plans ready in case he goes to the wrong location, for the wrong reason, and doesn’t leave promptly.

Next, 26 school children, gaily decorated to represent the sockeye salmon run, will swim ‘upstream’ into the stadium. Plans are for thousands of kids to be doing this, but all the costumes may not turn up as forecast.

Enormous symbolic hockey players will then be lowered from the ceiling onto the field, their teeth falling out and transforming into magical fairies that will pull each other’s wings over their heads and artistically thump the crap out of each other, to the old Hockey Night in Canada theme.

In a bid to recognize regional culture, plans call for enormously bright lights to descend from the ceiling, with brilliant white duct work and fans emerging from the sidelines. Beneath this apparatus, a huge green plant will sprout and grow, like the world’s hopes and dreams. This ‘Growth Operation’ as organizers call it, will symbolize action on climate change and also upholds our province’s carbon neutrality.

Upon reaching full height, bags of this enormous plant’s leaves and buds will be distributed by colourful bikers to a crowd of snowboarders at the top of huge ramps.

As snow falls from the ceiling, these boarders will then ‘ski’ out of bounds and be saved by a multi-ethnic rescue team. This team will then align themselves with the dreams of the people of Vancouver and hurl the ‘out of bounders’ into an enormous, beaver-shaped wood-chipper.

When the athletes enter, the roar of the digitally enhanced crowd will be overwhelming, mercifully drowning out the sound of Rita McNeil and Celine Dion singing Ave Maria, accompanied by bagpipes.

Finally, the moment the crowd and the world eagerly awaits – the entrance of the Olympic torch.

A mysterious shape will emerge from the far end of the stadium. At centre field on an artificial ice surface, the head of the Canadian delegation, Trevor Linden, will shoot a flaming puck at the object, now revealed in all its glory.

There, burning brightly in effigy, is –

Jerome Iginla – the Eternal Flame.

Let the games begin!