Hawking with an umbrella or two ... Big Bang to Ian Drury’s Spasticus Autisticus ...

The one thing the British Olympics and now the Paralympics is doing ... is opening our eyes to life on earth – as it was, how it became and now as it is – we are humans, regardless of our physical appearance ...

Aerobatic Disabled Performers

Let’s rejoice in our humanness and our ability to achieve in the face of adversity ... let’s rejoice in our technological advances, particularly those in our lifetimes ... and of course – let’s accept and educate others in that acceptance of the wondrousness of being able to live with everyone ...

An opening sequence

I hope we will all go out and help others in some way or other ... add to our curriculum vitae by offering selflessly to others, who need that extra fillip ...

... that time we can give with a bubbly smile and laughing eyes, a conversation, a sit-down with them without expressing pressure of life and the need to get on with our own lives.

Newton's apples, the roladex of words, the
book maze

Crumbs – that Opening Ceremony ... swept the breadcrumbs to one side and showed what could be done by so many, with people working together ...  crumbs = what a show ... what a Paralympics Opening Ceremony ...

Stephen Hawking

Only in Britain could you combine umbrellas by the dozen with the Big Bang, the proponent of that theory – Stephen Hawking – words from Shakespeare, and via a synthesiser giving us Hawking’s pearls of wisdom:

“We live in a universe governed by rational laws that we can discover and understand. 

Look up at the stars and not down at your feet.  Try to make sense of what you see and wonder about what makes the universe exist. 

Be curious.” 

Dame Tanni Grey Thompson
wheelchair flying

I’d add ... ‘be perceptive to others’ in all walks of life – open those windows onto an all inclusive world.’

The show was called Enlightenment ... and took us across 13.75 billion years in an hour and a half ...  starting with the Big Bang: an explosion of umbrellas and fireworks ...

... through dance, high wire, circus ‘tricks’ showing us science and discovery ... Shakespeare and the printing press (books and reading), Newton and his apples – that great period in European history when the intellectual revolution took place between 1550 and 1720.

High tech bending poles atop with disabled
performers - more umbrellas ....

The Daily Telegraph’s article entitled “A stirring journey to enlightenment” – is appropriately sub-titled “From the building blocks of science to the struggle for universal human rights, this ceremony grappled with the biggest of issues”.

The Paralympics coming home in London 2012 is an opportunity for the world to look again at what these incredible human beings can do in all forms of sport ...

David Toole, a dancer who was born without legs,
was part of the aerial ballet

... their humanness has stretched them on their road to success – from birth, from accident, from war zones, from attacks – they are still human ... brushing their hair has to go on, they have to get up and face the day ... overcoming obstacles, becoming motivated, having a will and a determination to succeed.

Named after the Graeae of
Greek Mythology ... the organisation
composed of artists and managers
with physical and sensory disabilities
Graeae Theatre Company

Human endeavour knows no boundaries and nor should we in our thoughts (words and deeds) – I can only watch in amazement ... and listen to the back stories that are being told ... and then just being incredulous at the hope these athletes will give others.

If – that magic word “IF” – if we can become humans in their likeness ... we will really change the world around us, and that ripple of hope will spread further than it’s ever done before.

Eleanor Roosevelt with the Spanish
version of the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights (1948)

Seb Coe’s words articulating the evening’s purpose ... “Sport is about what you can do, what you can achieve, the limits you can reach, the barriers you can break.

Sport shows what is possible.  Sport refuses to take no for an answer.  And everything sport stands for we are going to see right here, right now ... and during the Parlympics.”

So with a show sporting flying golden wheel chairs, circus skills from disabled performers (learnt from scratch), an aerial ballet, a dancer who was born without legs, deaf and disabled athletes performing circus feats, amputees performing gravity-defying acrobatics, deaf and blind performers, and more ...

Ian Drury's Spasticus Autisticus single

An Opening Ceremony showing grit and determination by performers pushing themselves beyond their limits ... leading to the paralympians showing us what they are capable of during the Games ... which will leave many of us breathless in admiration for their tireless pursuit of their dreams.

Let us embrace all our peoples and put into effect the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – enacted after the 2^nd World War – that all human beings are inherently entitled to equal human rights.

The Paralympics Ceremony refused to allow the performers’ disabilities to restrict the breadth of its ambition in any way – artists with physical and sensory disabilities explored their boundaries ... while we the audience looked forward to what was ahead ...

Links:  
Ian Drury - Wiki page ... including words of the 1981 Spasticus Autisticus 
2012 Summer Paralympics c/o Wikipedia
Daily Telegraph - an article on the Paralympics
The Guardian Paralympics Opening Ceremony article

Hilary Melton-Butcher

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