The closing ceremony of the London 2012 was absolutely dope! If you are my generation or elder, you'd probably enjoy the ceremony, which was literally a British invasion concert. Entitled "A Symphony of British Music", the ceremony boasted a line up of Britain's best music and performers, spanning across the 60's (maybe earlier too? I am not sure how back some of them artist date) up to the latest acts. I purposely connected my television to the stereo system to have the best sound system for the performances throughout the night. Boy did I enjoyed myself singing to some of the world's most famous tunes. Of course, there were several performances which I particularly enjoyed over the rest, but all in all, it was a superb ceremony to celebrate the close of the Games.
The night kicked off with "Rush Hour", which definitely depicted the chaos of Britain's daily rush hour, with the honking of cars on the streets (you get this a lot on Malaysian roads too, so the familiarity was ironic). "Street Party" was next, and of course, being a Directioner, I gotta love One Direction's performance! Their outfit was simple, but speaks high street fashion. Liam was particularly good looking that night, and even though it was just a short performance, they got me singing along to a remixed version of their hit debut single What Makes You Beautiful. What I loved about this segment is the splash of different colour outfits worn by the performers (mostly young talents), which totally gives the entire party a vibrant feeling and getting the audience to sing along to the tunes.
Rush Hour
A feature of London's famous skyline landmarks - Tower Bridge, London Eye, Clock Tower (now Elizabeth Tower to commemorate Queen Elizabeth's Diamond Jubilee) and the Gherkin
Street Party performers in splash of colours
One Direction performing What Makes You Beautiful
As Olympic tradition, the entrance of the flag bearers and athletes into the stadium at the closing ceremony was not according to their nations, but to come out together to fill up the stadium. The new twist though, was to have some of the athletes coming through the audience and making their way to the large Union Flag at the centre of the stadium. Definitely a wonderful sight to see all the athletes coming in together and celebrating the Games regardless of their nationality.
Flag bearers
Parade of athletes into the stadium
The athletes of the London 2012 forming the giant Union Flag
The real party then started with "A Symphony of British Music". There was definitely music for people of all ages with performances from Queen, John Lennon (obviously not himself, but an artistic image of him was featured on stage), Kate Bush (she did not perform live though, but a 2012 remix of Running Up That Hill was recorded for an artistic segment of the ceremony), Annie Lennox, Fatboy Slim, Jessie J, Muse, Taio Cruz (I totally didn't know he is British) and many more. There was even a section to pay homage to the British fashion industry, which featured some of Britain's top fashion labels such as Burberry, Victoria Beckham, Alexander McQueen and Paul Smith. But the highlight of this entire segment was of course the performances from Spice Girls! Who doesn't love them? Like seriously, if you haven't heard of them, go find out about them already. It felt as if they weren't even broken up from the last time they performed together! Victoria Beckham is as smoking hot and posh as ever, and Emma Bunton is as sweet and cute as ever. The only sad thing was how short their performance was. I was totally expecting more from them given how successful they were and how every Spice Girls fans wished for them to have a reunion performance. Nevertheless, their medley of Wannabe and Spice Up Your Life probably stole the audience that night! This was then followed by Liam Gallagher singing Wonderwall, which was definitely a nostalgic moment because I grew up listening to this song. Eric Idle of the comedy group Monty Python provided a dose of good laughter with his humourous performance of Always Look On The Bright Side of Life.
The Spice Girls performing on those cute little London cabs. They were phenomenal!
Tribute to British fashion industry
Eric Idle
Then came the handover ceremony from host city London to Rio de Janeiro, the host city of the 2016 Summer Olympics. Rio's presentation was filled with rich Latin music and samba parade. Bring it on Rio 2016! I am gonna work my way to fly over to Brazil to watch the Rio 2016 Games!
Fireworks accompanying the handover ceremony from London to Rio, in Brazil colours
Celebrating Rio 2016!
A somber moment followed as the Olympic cauldron was "opened" or lowered to feature all 204 individual stem and petals in a flower-like structure. I seriously thought the flame was going to be extinguished immediately following the opening of the cauldron, but boy was I surprised by another highlight (and definitely one of my favourite) performance from Take That, who sang Rule The World. Come midnight, the flame was officially extinguished, signifying the end of the Games of the XXX Olympiad. Once again, this amazing cauldron by Thomas Heatherwick is one beautiful piece of art. I think I teared a little when the flame was finally extinguished to reveal the charred copper petals. The ceremony ended with a medley performance from The Who (for those of you who don't know, the opening themes of all three CSI franchise are performed by them).
The Olympic flame burning night and day throughout the Games
The opening of the Olympic cauldron into a flower-like structure of individual stems and petals
Take That singing their hearts out to Britain and the world with Rule The World
And the ceremony ended with a display of fireworks
What a spectacular way to end the London Olympic Games experience. I'd like to give a shout out to the athletes, especially swimmers and divers who have entertained and inspired me throughout these Games, keeping my sports spirits alive despite quitting competitive swimming years ago, and to the host city for pulling off two quintessentially British ceremonies with a bang!
Photos source from London 2012, the official Games website.
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