Members of the US delegation parade Sunday throughout the closing ceremony of the 2024 Paralympics in Paris
Thibault Camus/AP
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Thibault Camus/AP
SAINT-DENIS, France — This time, it truly is au revoir.
A summer season sporting bonanza which began below pouring rain on July 26 with a outstanding opening ceremony for the Paris Olympics on the Seine River ended Sunday with the Paralympics closing ceremony at a rain-soaked Stade de France.
It lowers the curtain on profitable back-to-back Video games that captivated followers and raised the bar excessive for others to observe. Good luck Los Angeles in 2028.
Because the stadium was lit up within the blue, white and purple colours of the French nationwide flag, a trumpet participant performed the nationwide anthem “La Marseillaise” and Paralympic flagbearers then made their method into the stadium carrying nationwide flags to the sound of “Chariots of Fire” by Vangelis.
“Everyone can see what an inclusive world is like,” Tony Estanguet, the pinnacle of the Paris Olympics in 2024, stated in his closing speech. “Now there is no turning back.”
The Worldwide Paralympic Committee president Andrew Parsons stated France excelled itself as a bunch in each Video games.
“Paris 2024 has set a benchmark for all future Paralympic Games,” Parsons stated. “For a country famous for its fashion and its food, France is now famous for its fans.”
The group clapped alongside to a breakdancing set, earlier than Tony Award winner Ali Stroker carried out the American nationwide anthem as part of the handoff to Los Angeles.
Stroker made historical past in 2019 as the primary one that makes use of a wheelchair to win a Tony Award for her flip as Ado Annie within the Broadway revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Oklahoma!” In one other portion of the screened handoff to LA, Venice Seashore Skate Park reworked right into a 360-degree stage that includes skate boarders and wheelchair motocross riders.
Then, the gang roared as famed French digital music composer Jean-Michel Jarre started closing out the ceremony, which was once more led by inventive director Thomas Jolly.
The 76-year-old Jarre span tunes as in a Parisian nightclub, oblivious to the rain lashing down on him.
Jolly wished to show the stadium into an enormous open-air dance occasion. Greater than 20 DJs, together with Étienne de Crécy, Martin Solveig and Kavinsky, adopted the trailblazer Jarre in a tribute to French electro music to the theme “Journey of the Wave.”
Or the wave goodbye from the 64,000 followers, and the town itself, to the greater than 4,000 Paralympic athletes.
Summer season vibes stored going
After the profitable Olympics showcased the vibrancy of followers from world wide and the fantastic thing about the town’s iconic venues, there have been doubts that the vitality would maintain going into the Aug. 28-Sept. 8 Paralympics.
These doubts have been dispelled, with athletes having fun with sturdy help. Not all venues have been offered out, however this was additionally as a result of the summer season vacation interval was ending and youngsters have been returning to highschool.
A surge of enthusiasm noticed 2.4 million tickets of the two.8 million tickets offered — second solely to the two.7 million offered on the 2012 London Video games — and this was some feat contemplating that by late June just one million had been offered.
Massive swathes of Parisians vacated — some say fled — the town amid considerations over site visitors chaos, political upheaval, social tensions and rising fears over safety.
However locals who stayed or French followers coming in from different cities and cities gave their athletes enormous help over each Video games.
“With the Games we rediscovered our creativity,” stated Estanguet, a former Olympic canoeing champion. “The France which smiles, which loves itself.”
French success on and off the monitor
Within the Olympics, France tallied 16 golds amongst its 64 medals to complete fifth total within the medal depend, and it gained 75 medals total within the Paralympics.
The Video games themselves have been a hit for French President Emmanuel Macron. Transport ran properly, there have been only a few organizational glitches and safety points have been appeased, with police even partaking in pleasant banter or posing for pictures with followers — a rarity in France.
For the way lengthy the feel-good issue stays stays to be seen.
An early indication got here on Saturday, when hundreds took to the streets to protests the president’s appointment of a conservative new prime minister.
There have been some boos for Macron when he was launched firstly of the ceremony.
Plus ça change, because the French saying goes.
