Athenians Cheer Surprise Success

ATHENS, Greece – When gold medalist Stefano Baldini staggered into Athens’s Panathinaiko Stadium to win the men’s marathon yesterday, the look of grim determination on his face gave way to a relieved grin. It was a smile that would look familiar before the night was through.Just over an hour after the marathon ended, a similar smile appeared on the face of Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki, who was attending the Closing Ceremony for the 28th Olympiad. Angelopoulos-Daskalaki, the Athens Olympic Committee President, had been brought in to save the Olympics after two previous ATHOC presidents were fired and the IOC issued a warning that it was considering relocating the Olympics because of the lack of preparations in Athens. Beaming alongside her last night was Athens Mayor Dora Bakoyannis, who, a year and half before the Games, admitted, “Everything about the Olympics worries me until it works.”Mayor Bakoyannis can finally relax; the Athens Olympics are over. Before they even began, newspapers, politicians, and athletes argued that holding the Games in Athens would pose a security risk.But the most significant act of violence throughout the 17-day event occurred towards the end of the marathon, the last competition of the Games, when a defrocked Irish priest named Cornelius Horan ran up to marathon frontrunner Vanderlei de Lima of Brazil and pushed him into the crowd of spectators. As security breaches go, it was bizarre – and may have contributed to de Lima’s third-place finish – but not overwhelming.The same Cassandras insisted that the venues wouldn’t be finished in time for the Games, and that transportation around the serpentine city would be a mess. But I made it from the marathon – where we spectators cheered de Lima louder than any gold medalist while he threw kisses to the crowd – to the spanking new Olympic stadium on the subway in less than an hour. (That included a security check and a mad dash to the stadium entrance, during which volunteers cheered me and other latecomers on in three different languages.)Given how gloriously the Athens Olympic Committee and the host city defied low expectations to put on successful games, Angelopoulos-Daskalaki can be forgiven for crowing a little at the closing ceremony. In her speech, she boasted about history being made at the games, citing “the most athletes in history,most women in history, first global torch relay…safe and secure games, blessed by a climate of celebration and joy.”When the closing celebration began, a field of wheat ready for threshing covered the floor that had held a lake during the opening ceremony. The program explained that, “In Greek festivities, wheat symbolized the fertility of the earth, the awakening of life.” But to an Olympics watcher, the plastic “wheat” being picked by actors in traditional Greek dress could only represent the harvest that Greece would like to reap as a result of the Olympics.“We hope to see you again,” Angelopoulos-Daskalakis told the crowd. She was clearly hoping that the Olympics would increase tourism to Greece, where the industry has been flagging since entry into the EU made Greece much more expensive than nearby countries such as Turkey and Croatia. Angelopoulos-Daskalakis went on to assure spectators and millions of viewers worldwide that, “Greece, like our amazing athletes, knows how to win,” perhaps hoping to inspire investment in the country in future.If the long-term impact of the Games is yet to be seen, there is no doubt that the planners’ first goal was achieved. “We introduced a new Greece to the world,” Angelopoulos-Daskalakis insisted.Backing up that claim was International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge, who, after receiving thunderous applause for venturing to say “Dear friends” in Greek, added in French, “You won! You have won by brilliantly meeting the tough challenge of holding the games.”The Athens Games have not been perfect. The first week saw low attendance at several venues. There were a number of doping cases involving Olympians, both Greek and otherwise. Angelopoulos-Daskalakis started a mini-forest fire by setting off fireworks at a celebratory dinner party at her home.Some dignitaries stayed away from Athens, most notably U.S. Secretary of State Powell, whose planned trip was cancelled after a series of protests against his visit were held in central Athens. But the venues, organization, and volunteers all conspired to make a surprise success out of an Olympiad that was supposed to be a serious failure.After Rogge’s words of praise came the official business of Mayor Bakoyannis passing on the Olympic flag to the Mayor of the 2008 host city, Beijing. The closing ceremony then devolved into a huge glendi, the Greek word for party.Six national pop stars sang Greek hits while balloons, fireworks, confetti, and streamers poured from the Calatrava roof. Athletes from the 202 participating countries ran around wielding stalks of wheat and stomping on the balloons with as much glee and determination as grooms at a Jewish wedding. (The most vigorous stomping came from the team of wild Canadians, a phrase which, under most other circumstances, would seem to be an oxymoron.)Director Dimitris Papaioannou described the event he had planned as “a party like those we used to have on the roof, with the record player going and us dancing, singing, and falling in love under the stars.”Perhaps the most symbolic segment of the closing ceremony was not the celebration at the end, but that at the beginning, when troupes of dancers and actors dressed in Greek costumes from various time periods re-enacted a Greek wedding, complete with feasting, dancing, and bonfires. With their expensive new venues and exceeded budgets, these Olympics are reminiscent of those weddings in which the family has no idea how they’ll pay for bash afterwards, but, for the moment, cares only about expressing joy and impressing loved ones, friends, and neighbors.Maybe the Olympics represent a new start for Athens. It’s equally possible that starting tomorrow the sparkling metropolis will slowly relax back into a collection of somewhat dingy neighborhoods, each centered around a church and a square where old men watch their grandchildren ram into each other on scooters.But for this evening, and this celebration, Athens shone. The mayor wasn’t the only one who was relieved. In his speech, IOC President Jacques Rogge called the 28th Olympiad “unforgettable, dream games.”The woman seated behind me muttered, “Bravo! Someone finally said it!”

Athenians Cheer Surprise Success

Athenians Cheer Surprise Success

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