The Paris Paralympics begin on Wednesday with a spectacular opening ceremony in a city still on a high after the highly successful Olympics.
A new generation of Paralympians will join seasoned veterans competing in many of the same venues that hosted Olympic sports.
A total of 18 of the 35 Olympic venues will be used for the Paralympics, which run until September 8, including the Grand Palais which scored rave reviews for its hosting of the fencing and taekwondo under an ornate roof.
The La Defense Arena is back as well, hosting the 141 gold-medal events in para-swimming, as is the Stade de France where track and field again takes place.
The Games will open with a ceremony in Place de la Concorde, the square in the centre of Paris where skateboarding and other ‘urban’ sports took place during the Olympics.
Just as for the Olympics ceremony on the River Seine, the ceremony takes place away from the main stadium for the first time at a Paralympics.
The Paralympic flame was ignited in the Games’ original location, Stoke Mandeville Hospital in England, then transported to France via the Channel Tunnel.
There is significant symbolism in placing the Paralympic ceremony in the heart of the French capital, a city whose Metro system, in particular, is wholly unsuited to the needs of wheelchair users, according to theater director Thomas Jolly, who also directed the opening ceremony of the Olympics.
“Putting Paralympic athletes in the heart of the city is already a political marker in the sense that the city is not sufficiently adapted to every handicapped person,” Jolly said.
In contrast, the organizers claim that Paris buses are wheelchair-accessible, and they have also reserved 1,000 specially equipped taxis.
Since the Olympics, slow ticket sales have perked up, and according to the organizers, more over 1.9 million have been sold.
