Special Olympics World Summer Games Opening Ceremony honors bravery
Cuban Special Olympics athletes Lilianni Salgado and Darianny Urtado hand off the torch to USA Special Olympics athlete Destiny Sanchez. (Miriam Bribiesca/Daily Bruin Senior Staff)
By Korbin Placet
July 27, 2015 7:23 a.m.
When the 165 delegations of athletes walked into the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum Saturday night they weren’t holding their nations’ flags. Instead, they were holding each other, walking hand in hand, raising their arms, reaching up.
The 6,500 athletes who attended the Opening Ceremony of the 2015 Special Olympics World Summer Games were welcomed by tens of thousands of cheering people in the stands.
This is first time since 1972 that Los Angeles has hosted the Special Olympics World Summer Games, and it is believed to be the largest congregation of athletes in Los Angeles since the 1984 Summer Olympics.
First Lady Michelle Obama was in attendance as an honorary co-chair of the World Summer Games, welcoming the athletes and getting the Games under way.
“These Games show us we’re all in this together,” Obama said at the ceremony. “That we can bring out the best in each other.”
During her speech she championed the Special Olympics themes of joy and acceptance, and expressed how the athletes are what bring the common people together.
“At our core we all want the same things, a sense of pride in who we are and a belief that we can all reach our dreams no matter what challenges we face,” said the first lady. “You’re uniting us in a way that nothing else can.”
The rest of the Opening Ceremony featured athletes and celebrities together on stage celebrating the Games and the messages of inclusion and bravery. Kansas City Chiefs running back Jamaal Charles, a former Special Olympics athlete, addressed the crowd from the main stage reflecting on his experience participating in his first Special Olympics event and how that changed his life.
“I was afraid. I was lost. I had trouble reading. I found out I had a learning disability. People made fun of me. They said I would never go anywhere. But I learned I can fly,” Charles said. “When I was 10 years I had the chance to compete in the Special Olympics. The Special Olympics gave me my first chance to discover a talent I did not know I had.”
Charles concluded by leading the athletes in the Special Olympics athlete oath.
Also throughout the ceremony there were musical performances that included Stevie Wonder, O.A.R. and Cassadee Pope.
Maria Shriver, the daughter of Special Olympics founder Eunice Kennedy Shriver, spoke part way through the ceremony about how much the Special Olympics World Games has grown. She added how proud her mother would have been of the organization and all the athletes.
“She was so proud of you and wanted more than anything for you to be respected, valued, appreciated for who you are,” Shriver said. “Brave, good, kind, solid, and, yes, smart human beings.”
The ceremony ended with the last leg of the running of the torch, notably, the passing of the torch from Iran to Israel, and from Cuba to the U.S. During the running of the torch, Avril Lavigne sang “Fly,” a song she wrote that benefits the Special Olympics World Summer Games.
The actual lighting of the cauldron at the coliseum culminated with fireworks.
The 2015 Special Olympics World Summer Games will be going on from July 25 to August 2. The events taking place at UCLA are softball, tennis, football (soccer), volleyball, judo and both artistic and rhythmic gymnastics.
