Thursday, August 28, 2008

Hidden Code in the Opening Ceremony

A friend who recently returned from Beijing told the story of how Beijingers decoded the Olympics opening ceremony.

The first element was uncovered based on the widespread suspicion of the way "harmony" was displayed. Several times during the performances, the character appeared without its usual accompanying . The only explanation was that this was intentional. On the other hand, though the word is normally pronounced as "he," when playing mahjong it appears on a tile and is read as "Hu" - .

Then came the picture of a silk weaver, followed by scenes of the Silk Road. Well, the traditional Chinese word for silk is - Jin.

Next, ocean waves carried many boats, and formations showed Zheng He leading a team of voyagers into the Pacific. What is the Chinese character for "waves"? - tao.

Do you see the code now?

I am truly fond of the street wisdom of Beijingers and their fun-seeking nature. No doubt more messages will be unraveled in the months to come. :-)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

With four hours showbiz, rich in historical symbolism, surely it should be possible to find almost in any hidden message you wanted? :-)

Josh said...

Please forgive me here - I feel pretty stupid and ignorant in asking this. I've even studied Chinese for a couple of years (written and oral) and I can't seem to figure this out.

I don't get the code! You spelled it out, but I need you to read it for me.

I'm really interested to know.

Xujun said...

It is the name of China's president, Hu Jin-tao. The Beijingers have figured out a fun word game. :-)

If you are interested in Chinese word games, you can find plenty in China's literary history. Perhaps you can ask your Chinese teacher to provide a few examples. Have fun!