Jan Mowbray – Ward 3 Councillor

I read this piece by Mike Salisbury, ward 4 councillor, City of Guelph.  With his permission I offer it here as it speaks for me as well as a great many others….

Like many Canadians I spoke with over the last few weeks, I couldn’t help but draw comparisons between the opening ceremonies of the Canadian Winter Olympics and the opening ceremonies of the recent summer Olympics in Beijing.

Without a question, the Beijing opening ceremonies were flawless and awe inspiring. They were a spectacle the kind of which may never have been witnessed before. The Canadian opening ceremonies were…well, not exactly flawless.

As many of you know, the fourth ‘leg’ of the Olympic cauldron didn’t work. It failed to rise up out of the floor leaving one of our torch bearers holding the bag, or more precisely, holding the torch.

In the weeks that followed I heard many people respond critically about our opening ceremonies; it wasn’t “perfect” – it “failed” – it was an “embarrassment”. I began to contemplate how well, or how poorly, our opening ceremonies portrayed our nation to the rest of the world. It wasn’t until 17 days later watching the closing ceremonies that it became apparent just how proud I am to be a Canadian.

Perhaps one of the moments I remember most vividly about the opening ceremonies in Beijing was the little girl in the pigtails and red dress who sang the anthem. Lin Miaoke, a cute 9 year old from Beijing become a national sensation and darling to the international media following her performance; the only problem, she was a fake.

The real singer was a seven-year-old girl named Yang Peiyi. She had won a gruelling competition to perform the anthem, but was pulled at the last minute because while she had a perfect voice, she wasn’t considered pretty enough to represent her nation to the rest of the world. So on the night of the opening ceremonies, while a pre-recording of Yang Peiyi played Lin Miaoke was seen but not heard.

By contrast, our opening ceremonies were flawlessly real – warts and all.

The way I see it, life doesn’t always work out the way we want it to. Sometimes we fail, we don’t get that job we wanted, we miss the bus, or our fancy Olympic flame just doesn’t work right. As Canadians we pick each other up and we just keep going.

We also laugh about our follies. It was no surprise that our closing ceremonies opened with a three legged Olympic torch complete with a theatrical “mechanic” who after several unsuccessful attempts ultimately succeeds in pulling up the arm with an imaginary rope so that Catriona Ann Le May Doan, the athlete who was previously denied, is given the honour of lighting the cauldron.

Perseverance, tolerance, creativity, humour, helping each other to become great…THAT is being Canadian, and I am proud we shared it with the world.