For two weeks, the watching world has been gripped by images of athletes from
204 countries stretching the limits of human physical achievement. Here, in a
special issue of Extra, we present the photographs that capture the joy, pain
and sheer wonder of the Games, while Paul Newman explains why the Beijing
Olympics were the most spectacular of all time.
For more than a week, the view from the The Independent's apartment on the 14th
floor at the North Star Media Village here at the Olympic Games was what you
would expect in the residential suburb of a modern city – tower blocks, roads,
cars and people for as far as the eye could see. On a good day you might peer
through the smog for up to a mile, but on a bad one you would not even make out
the roof of a high-rise building 200 yards away.
In the middle of the Games, however, we opened our curtains to a quite
different sight. The skies, which had been a murky white every day, were a
clear blue and there in the distance, more than 40 miles away, were the
mountains that ring the western flank of Beijing. It was not long before the
smog returned, but at least you knew that another world did indeed exist beyond
the choking confines of this tumultuous city.
At times, the Games themselves have been similarly deceptive. For the most part
– even if you have been here watching or reporting on the action rather than
viewing it at home on television – we have witnessed only the beauty of modern
sport, with the world's greatest athletes performing wonderful feats to a
backdrop of spectacular settings. Television cameras and stills photographers
have homed in on the faces of those who have strained every sinew and reacted
with joy or despair to their performance, in the knowledge that four years'
work has been condensed into one heart-stoppingly brief flurry of activity.
Occasionally, however, you have a glimpse into another world: a view down a
ramshackle side-street alongside the gleaming splendour of the new and (for the
past fortnight at least) unclogged expressways that link the Olympic venues;
the tears of the Chinese shooter Du Li, who crumbled under the weight of a
nation expecting her to win the first medal of the Games; the armed guards and
soldiers who lurk behind every fence surrounding the secure bubble that
encloses each Olympic site; the photographs of the documents that seemed to
prove that the host nation had lied about the age of its gold medal-winning
female gymnast He Kexin.
Revelations in the days after the jaw-dropping opening ceremony had told you
that everything might not be quite what it seemed. The nine-year-old who sang
"Ode to the Motherland" had been miming because the real singer was not
considered pretty enough, while the children supposedly representing China's 56
ethnic minorities were reported to be actors. The fireworks that lit up the
skies over Beijing were real enough, but the television pictures that went
around the world included pre-recorded footage from a dress rehearsal.
China wanted to host the Olympics in order to gain acceptance on the world
stage, to prove that it is a modern country at ease with the monumental
challenge of staging the planet's greatest sporting extravaganza. The images
that have gone around the globe have mostly done that – we will forgive them a
fake firework or two – though it remains to be seen whether the Games have done
anything to ease the world's concerns at wider issues here, like human rights
and pollution.
In the end, the images that will endure will be those of great sporting
moments. For most of the world, that means the astonishing feats of superstars
like Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt. For Britain, it will be the memories of the
efforts of new heroes and heroines, like Rebecca Adlington and Victoria
Pendleton; of established Olympians, like Ben Ainslie and Bradley Wiggins; or
of self-effacing team players, like rower Steve Williams and cyclist Paul
Manning.
Their feats, their dedication and their openness – for journalists, it has been
a joy to speak to athletes who actually want to tell their stories to the world
– have clearly captured the imagination of a nation that has grown tired of
pampered and under-achieving footballers. London and 2012 cannot come soon
enough.
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