Melbourne – Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremonies
It’s time for the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne! The city is decked out in glitz and glitter, complete with dozens of huge television screens throughout the parks and town squares. The atmosphere here is fun! There are so many people from so many different nationalities cheering on their teams and loving the camaraderie. With over 70 Commonwealth countries participating in the games, the cultural diversity is overwhelming and exciting, and Melbourne is showing off this diversity to the best of it’s ability. More than 100 bands will perform in the twelve days of the Games -most of the shows are free and perfect for a backpacker budget! Emma and I are looking into purchasing tickets for a few of the less expensive games, and we will certainly make sure to see the free events that take place along Melbourne’s streets.
Waiting along the Yarra River for the games to begin
Commonwealth Opening Ceremonies – We grabbed a spot along the Yarra River to watch the opening ceremonies, and they were truly spectacular. Most of Melbourne camped beside us on the riverbanks throughout the afternoon, and we made several runs to Coles and the local bottle shop for snacks and wine. The ceremonies began with a relay line of 70+ metal fish, each representing one of the competing countries. During the ceremony, these fishies danced, sprayed water in time with the music, flashed fireworks, and put on an impressive light show. The river was also used to transport the Queen’s baton (similiar to the Olympic torch). There were several well known Australian singers and performers in the ceremony, none of which I can recall by name. I happened to like the the flying tram and lifesize koalas that floated through the air on a kayak. Let the festivities begin!
Melbourne Festivities
Tackling the Games -After our night on the Yarra, we laid out a schedule about how best to enjoy the games. Most of our time was spent lounging in one of the many ‘live site’ gardens throughout the city, watching the events on the grand t.v’s, or sipping wine and listening to various bands. There was certainly a network of visual spectacles and exhibitions to take advantage of during the afternoons and evenings. We saw tribal dancers from the Solomon Islands, reggae musicians from Fiji, a Jaipur Kawa Brass Band (memories from India), jazz musicians, West African drummers, worldwide dance companies, theater acts, comedy routines, Kenya acrobats, and the list goes on and on and on. One of the best acts was a children’s choir from Africa. The children were discovered by an Australian mining enginer in a remote village of Tanzania. They were brilliant!
Learning a bit of Rugby – Although it was easy enough to bring a couple bottles of wine and sit in the sunshine for hours listening to the entertainment, we did manage to splurge on some Rugby 7’s tickets. This is an event that I’m proud to admit I can understand (one quarter expert anyway!) This type of Rugby only lasts for 14 minutes, consisting of two 7 minute halves. Since the games were so short, we saw 8 matches and were able to witness some of the best Rugby 7’s teams in the world compete in Melbourne’s Telstra Dome.
Fiji, the Cook Islands, New Zealand, England, Australia, Wales and South Africa all put on quite a show on the field below us. I seemed to be the only one in the entire 3rd section of the stadium that had never seen a Rugby game before. Therefore, I had about a dozen people turning to me to explain each and every play. For some reason, instead of calling a winning goal a “touchdown,” it is called a “try.” Until I found out this little fact, I was thinking how neat it was that they actually gave the teams points for trying to score a goal and putting forth the effort. I was gently taken aside and told, “No Ash, a try is the actual goal.” I’m learning…..slowly. My next goal is to learn cricket!!! 🙂
We also saw the men’s tri-athalon. The course ran along the beach in St. Kilda so we ventured out there to cheer on the running, swimming, and cycling. Of course, Australia was the favorite but I choose to cheer on a few of the lesser known athletes. Some of these poor blokes were so far behind that they were getting lapped again and again by the leaders of the pack. While most of the crowd left after the Australians and Canadians finished the course, we decided to stick around for the additional 1-1/2 hours that it took for the final runners to cross the finish line. The little Solomon Island boys were struggling through to the very end but they always had big smiles on their faces as they passed us along the road (probably because we were the only ones out there acknowledging their effort). Way to go boys!! We’re enjoying the fabulous atmosphere here, and there is plenty more to come!
