For those who may have missed the information, the 34th Olympiad will open in Paris this Friday, July 26, 2024, with the highlight of these Games being the opening ceremony, which has been announced as extraordinary.
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It is at exactly 8:24 p.m. that the boats will set sail for Paris 2024. The 94 boats of the athletes’ delegations will then set sail. This is the first time that an opening ceremony is held outside of a stadium. The course will be aquatic, on the water between the Pont d’Austerlitz and the Eiffel Tower, i.e. 6 km.
Read alsoParis 2024 Olympics: The Seine launches into the water
Rainy Olympics – Happy Olympics?
For now, the weather forecast is predicting a few possible showers, but nothing is certain… The organizers are keeping their fingers crossed. In any case, it will take more than that to undermine the morale of the 330,000 spectators expected, the equivalent of 4 French stadiums.
The best seats, seated, on the river bank, were sold for between 2,700 euros and 900 euros. But 200,000 invitations were distributed, certainly for more distant and standing places, but free.
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Many places have been distributed in Seine-Saint-Denis, the popular department in the North of Paris where some of the events will take place. Often through neighborhood associations. This is how the Reverterre-Labroue family, the parents and two children, who live in Saint-Denis, will be able to attend.
A family from Seine-Saint-Denis invited to the opening ceremony: it is the association, with which their daughters do sports, which offers them invitations, quite a surprise…
Among the audience, a hundred heads of state – who should not sing – and celebrities. Among the surprises tonight, we expect Celine Dion, Lady Gaga. The names of the pope of electro Ceronne, Juliette Armanet, Sofiane Pamart also come up a lot, without forgetting the most listened to French woman in the world, Aya Nakamura who has totaled almost 1 billion views on Youtube with her hit Djadja.
Will she perform La Vie en rose or another Edith Piaf song? In any case, Lady Gaga will be there for the Olympics, as will Quebec star Céline Dion, who suffers from a debilitating illness and has not sung since 2020…
It is culture, heritage, the French art of living that will be celebrated, without chauvinism and with surprising mixtures of genres: Aya Nakamura will reprise the repertoire of Charles Aznavour accompanied by the Republican Guard, Juliette Armanet is associated with the nonconformist pianist Sofiane Pamart for a cover of the pacifist anthem Conceived by John Lennon… And the rock metal band Gojira will perform with the opera singer Marina Viotti.
With its bridges, museums and monuments along the Seine such as the Tuileries or Notre Dame, Paris offers sumptuous settings… The roofs will also be used, for example the star dancer Guillaume Diop will perform on that of the Théâtre du Châtelet.
So it’s also a security challenge: tonight the airspace will be completely closed over Paris. And between the police, the military and the private security agents… There will be nearly 100,000 people keeping watch. If you’re good at maths, that’s 1 agent for 3 spectators…
The ceremony itself will begin at 7:30 p.m. So, it will still be daylight during a large part of the festivities, this is intended to avoid very energy-intensive lighting. These Paris games are intended to be exemplary and green.