What we know about the opening ceremony – Firstpost

After an Olympic opening ceremony on the Seine, the Paralympic Games will also open outside the stadiums on Wednesday, August 28.

The organizers have opted for a moving backdrop that stretches from the Arc de Triomphe to the Place de la Concorde. Artistic director Thomas Jolly has once again departed from the tradition of opening ceremonies. For almost three hours, the City of Light will be transformed into a stage.

50,000 spectators are expected to attend the ceremony, which begins at 7:40 p.m. local time.

Paris has chosen the famous Avenue des Champs-Élysées and the historic Place de la Concorde as venues for the opening ceremony.

The prestigious avenue that runs through the 8th arrondissement in the west of central Paris is dotted with cafes, palaces and luxury shops and connects in a straight line the Arc de Triomphe in the west with the Place de la Concorde in the east.

The Champs-Elysees

Tens of thousands of people crowd the two-kilometer-long, tree-lined main thoroughfare with its wide sidewalks every day.

For the French, it has long been a place of celebration and public gatherings.

There, American actress Jean Seberg appeared in Jean-Luc Godard’s legendary New Wave film Breathless in 1960 and sold copies of the New York Herald Tribune.

On Wednesday it will be the scene of a popular parade open to the public, with over 180 delegations and 4,400 Para-Olympians taking part.

France has celebrated two victories at the World Cup here, the traditional military parade on July 14, the national holiday, takes place here and the Tour de France cycling race ends here.

Hundreds of thousands of Parisians and tourists gather there to celebrate New Year’s Eve.

Once made up of fields and wasteland, the avenue first took shape when Louis XIV’s town planner first connected the Louvre to the Tuileries Garden in the mid-17th century.

At one end of the avenue stands the Arc de Triomphe, which was built on the orders of the French Emperor Napoleon and is now dedicated to the French war dead. It was inaugurated in 1836.

French President General Charles de Gaulle naturally chose this place for his triumphant return from exile on August 26, 1944, after Paris was liberated from the Nazis.

However, there have already been riots on the prestigious main street. When anti-government “yellow vests” attacked the Arc de Triomphe and looted shops in 2018, the police used tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon.

However, due to rising rents and falling sales, more and more shops and historic cinemas along the street are closing, and locals are gradually leaving the Champs-Elysees, fearing it is too noisy, dirty and expensive.

The Eiffel Tower, Paris’ other famous landmark, stands directly across the Seine. Its name is French for “Elysian Fields,” the paradise of dead heroes in Greek mythology.

Place de la Concorde

At the other end, the Place de la Concorde, the largest square in Paris, will be the scene of the official parade for ticket holders as well as the protocol and artistic procedures.

The square has a bloody past: known then as the “Place de la Revolution”, it was a place of executions during the French Revolution and it was here that heads rolled (literally).

King Louis XVI and his wife Marie-Antoinette were guillotined there in 1793 during the Reign of Terror that followed the Revolution of 1789.

After the July Revolution of 1830 it was renamed Concorde.

Today, the elegant cobbled square on the Seine is dominated by its enormous obelisk, one of two originally erected by Ramses II in front of the temple at Luxor in Egypt in the 13th century BC, and given to Paris in 1830.

(with contributions from AFP)