It may seem that the Tokyo Summer Olympics have just ended, but athletes from 91 countries have already arrived in Beijing for the 2022 Winter Olympics, getting ready to participate in 15 sports. Though the games were officially kicked off with the opening ceremony on February 4, competitions began the morning of February 2 with curling.
The Beijing Olympics welcomes over 2,800 athletes who will compete in 109 events, including seven new ones: men and women’s freestyle big air skiing, women’s monobob, snowboard cross, aerial freestyle skiing, short track speedskating relay, and ski jumping.
The location for the 2022 Winter Olympics was decided in late 2013, when Beijing, China, Almaty, Kazakhstan, and Oslo, Norway all entered the bid to host the games. Oslo would later withdraw from the bid and Beijing would win the election with 44 votes, becoming the first country to host both the Summer and Winter Olympics. But, such an accomplishment would not be achievable without the use of man-made snow.
However, despite winning the election for hosting the games, controversy surrounds the selection of Beijing. In December of 2021, Jen Psaki, White House Press Secretary, said “the [People’s Republic of China’s] ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and other human rights abuses” is why the Biden administration began a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Games. Joining the United States in this boycott is Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Lithuania, and Belgium.
With Covid-19 and boycotts opposing the Winter Olympics, the games still continue. Spectators—in-person and at home—watch the Opening Ceremonies, directed by Zhang Yimou, the Chinese filmmaker who planned the Summer Olympics Opening Ceremonies at the 2008 Beijing Games. This year’s Opening Ceremonies were quite simple in comparison to that of the 2008 games, but American athletes entered as the 55th country—with John Shuster and Brittany Bowe carrying the American flag during the Parade of Nations—decked out in their red, white, and blue Ralph Lauren uniforms.
In a TODAY show interview, Hilary Knight, who will be competing for America in ice hockey, said she was excited “to have Ralph Lauren outfit [the United States’ athletes] again” and, thanks to the built-in honeycomb-like fabric added to the uniform, “the insulation puffs up when you go outside in the cold and adapts to different environments.”
The Opening Ceremony was quite the spectacle. With bright lights, beautiful costumes and new uniforms, Zhang Yimou directs 3,000 performers who are mostly teenagers. As the Olympic cauldron has been lit at every Olympics since 1936, the host country chooses one or two athletes to light the cauldron. This year, Chinese cross country skier, Dinigeer Yilamujiang, and Nordic combined athlete, Zhao Jiawen, carried the torch to light the Olympic cauldron.
The 2022 Winter Olympics ran through most of February, ending with their closing ceremony on February 20. From March 4 through 13, 16 countries will participate in the Paralympics.
