CWG Opening Ceremony: I wish I were there

Finally after so much of negative publicity and last minute wake up by the Indian Govt., there was a lot to cheer about in the opening ceremony of XIX Common Wealth Games. I had the privilege of watching the ceremony live from the stadium, through TV (thanks to DD :-)), though I would have loved to be there. There are so many great moments to cherish from the last nights ceremony and few which I will remember for long are as below:

1. The huge crowd and their active and enthusiastic participation in all the events of the night made the ceremony such lively.
2. The huge cheer that the crowd gave to the Pakistani contingent was just awesome. That shows the spirit of sportsmanship of its true nature.
3. When President of India took the name of dignitaries present and she took the name of our previous president APJ Abdul Kalam, there was a huge round of applause from the crowd and they cheered like anything. That shows how much people of India love Dr. Kalam, even now.
4. The display of Yoga was a beautiful addition and loved to see that organizers tried to display that in the ceremony as Yoga is one of the most important contributions of ancient India to the world.
5. The sand art display of Gandhi's Dandi march was beautiful. That reminded me of "Manas Kumar Sahoo and Group" of 'India's Got Talent II' fame.
5. And finally A R Rehman. He was as usual mesmerizing. I was expecting "Jai Ho" song in between and that came. It was awesome to watch him perform and the crowd participated in it with so much of enthusiasm and energy.
6. And last but not the least, the Mehendi painting performed by the school kids in the beginning was beautiful. The picture came out so perfectly from under the curtain.

This and many more moments made the ceremony a memorable one for me. I am sure the world would have watched and will remember this for long.
I hope and pray the same continues for the rest of the CWG and India reaches its target 100 medals this time.

***Check out the latest medal tally of CWG 2010 here:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cwgmedaltally.cms