Furious Fiery Fancy over China's Olympic Flame

' To see things in the seed, that is genius. '

- Lau-tzu

Predict How Will the Beijing 2008 Olympic Cauldron be Lighted

China is a perennial surprise. Its discovery by western travelers in the 12^th century proved there exist an oriental civilization as seminal as Ancient Greece in threading the cultural carpets beneath every sunrise nation. Its naturally ancient tradition stayed mint amids the pressure of international political conflicts. Its long sleep from world trade and its dragonic economic awakening enchanted every yellowed and non-yellowed skin alike in manic awe and fear. What China will bring forth now that it will host the 2008 Olympiad is a futile guess. But we can always guess. Just like how Prometheus stole fire from the impervious gods, capture China's future ideas through advance thinking. Perhaps we can track China's next step by predicting how they will light the Olympic cauldron. See how your imagination fair with that of the most surprising civilization this millennium encountered.

Let us review how the recent past host cities culminated the relay of the divine flame, sun-kindled on a parabolic mirror at the cypress-shaded archaeological site in Olympia. Click on the pictures for the videos.

Seoul 1988
The ceremony which, showcased the Korean economic miracle to the world community, culminated with three athletes, each with a torch and stands on an elevating circular platform, lighting the cauldron. They represented sport, sciences and the arts being key opportunities to push beyond the barriers on the road to harmony and progress.

Barcelona 1992
The flame was passed from the torch of a runner to the arrow tip of the Paralympic archer Antonio Rebollo who immediately arched it into the cauldron from a platform at the opposite end of the stadium. In the subsequent Paralympics, the Olympic flame was carried by a paraplegic climber who hoisted himself up a rope to the cauldron.

Atlanta 1996
The American sentimentality was dramatized as the Parkinson victim, boxing light-heavyweight gold medalist Muhammad Ali raised the reed torch in trembling hand and ignited a special self-propelling torch that conveys the flame up a cable to the waiting scroll cauldron. The flame races around the enormous spiral, setting each jet ablaze.

Sydney 2000
After a long relay, including one under the Great Barrier Reef, the flame was passed to the aboriginal, 400m-run medalist Cathy Freeman who circled the boomerang torch over the cauldron ring beneath the pool she is stepping on. The fire-water ring elevated and journeyed up to the zenith of an inclined falls – exhibiting Australia's ode to the oceans.

Athens 2004
The progenitor of sports stressed its space and time legacy that it ignited the first flame to travel from Ancient Olympia to the rest of the world and back. The windsurfer Nikolaos Kaklamanakis raised the olive torch to the bowing olive cauldron, flaunting the power of man over machines and the future. The cauldron slowly swung up and lifted the flame high above the stadium.

Beijing 2008
The flame currently soars its way around mainland China following a phoenix graphical pattern and will reach the Bird's Nest cauldron, which at first I though is a cocoon, 100 days from now. It is relayed propane to propane burning from the lucky clouds graphic at the tip of the paper-scroll-shaped torches. Imagine the egg before the phoenix reaches its nest to lay. Predict how will the Beijing 2008 Olympic cauldron be lighted.

Prediction 1. Liu Xiang, the reigning world record holder in the 110 meter hurdles at 12.88 seconds, will leap fire obstacles and be flown up by a Chinese Phoenix to the cauldron representing Chana's shift from a leaping technocracy to a flying global economic power.

Prediction 2 . After a nautical parade, the cauldron will rise from beneath the creek beside the stadium to which Yao Ming, of the NBA Houston Rockets, will dribble a fire ball while riding a soaring lucky cloud to dunk into the cauldron -analogy to China's greatest achievement while being harmonious with nature.

Prediction 3. Chinese gymnasts will pass on the the flame in circle while hanging from the ntricate matrix of the Bird's Nest stadium roof. After which the roof's inner lining will form a scroll and be the olympic cauldron to which each gymnast will together ignite elaborating the slogan “One World, One Dream.”

Prediction 4. The Fuwa (Olympic mascot) kids - the Lin 6-year-old quintuplets from Shantou, Guandong Province representing fire, water, earth, wood and air - will form a totem pole (check promotional video), with the fiery red one on top lighting the cauldron.

These are just my personal thoughts. The countdown to their closeness to truth is still running below. Good Luck China! The World Awaits!

To Provoke the Senses
It is exciting to guess especially when your idea is strange yet a very likely outcome. Share your thoughts over the lines of Lao-tzu “To see things in the seed, that is genius.” My analogous interpretation is of course seeing the egg before the bird reaches the nest as exemplified by this post. What is your interpretation?