(Tokyo Olympics) "Pandemic" Olympics: From Tokyo 1964 to Tokyo 2020
China News Service, Tokyo, August 8, title: "Pandemic" Olympics: From Tokyo 1964 to Tokyo 2020
China News Agency reporter Zhu Chenxi Xing Chong
Although it is the summer of 2021, the "TOKYO2020" slogans hung around the streets of Tokyo seem to give people an illusion of time and space.
Perhaps people did not expect that it would be so unusual when the Summer Olympics came to Tokyo again after 1964.
Data map: On the streets of Tokyo, people walk past the 2020 Tokyo Olympics posters.
More than half a century ago, the Olympic flame was ignited for the first time in Eastern Asia of the world.
The 1964 Tokyo Olympics is also of great epoch-making significance for Japan.
After the end of the Second World War, Japan, which was devastated by the war, wanted to take advantage of the Olympics to show a new image and usher in an economic recovery.
For this reason, Tokyo has accelerated the pace of construction of a modern international metropolis.
Not only was the Metropolitan Expressway built in 1964. Ten days before the opening of the Olympic Games, the Tokaido Shinkansen, a high-speed rail link between Tokyo and Osaka, was opened to traffic. Since then, Japan's economic and social development has also entered the "fast lane"-Japanese domestic production in 1968 The best example is that the total value of West Germany surpassed that of West Germany to become the world's second largest economy.
The 1964 Tokyo Olympics is destined to become a milestone in the history of Japan's economic and social development. To this day, Japanese people still miss the "Olympic boom" brought to Japan by the Olympics.
Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe once said bluntly that whenever he closes his eyes, the opening ceremony of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics will come to mind vividly.
However, such an "Olympic boom" is difficult to reproduce.
Although Japan hosted the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and wanted to replicate the "Olympic boom" 56 years ago, especially to show Japan’s new image after the Fukushima earthquake and nuclear leak, the sudden new crown pneumonia epidemic disrupted everything. The Olympic Games, which was postponed for the first time in history, was deeply imprinted with the stigma of the epidemic.
In addition to facing the huge and complex problem of how to allocate huge expenses due to delays, problems in various links have emerged one after another. Only the opening and closing ceremonies, the creative team, have repeatedly "dismissed get out of class": the composer resigned because of bullying disabled classmates in his school days, and the director because of hegemony. Ling Fengbo was fired.
Data map: On February 12, 2021, at a meeting between Tokyo Committee Headquarters and members of the Council and Executive Committee, Yoshiro Mori, chairman of the Tokyo Olympic Organizing Committee, announced his resignation.
What's more serious is that the chairman of the Tokyo Olympic Organizing Committee, the core figure of the Tokyo Olympics, has all encountered a replacement storm. The former chairman of the Tokyo Olympic Organizing Committee and former Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori caused an uproar over his discriminatory remarks against women and eventually resigned.
Near the opening of the Olympics, the domestic epidemic in Japan rebounded, and the Japanese government had to announce that the Tokyo Olympics would be held under the "Declaration of Emergency Situations." The events held in Tokyo, Kanagawa, Chiba, Saitama and other places were all empty. It was held, and foreign audiences were refused entry to Japan to watch the games. This was also the first Olympic Games in history without audience participation.
The empty venue means that the ticket revenue of the Tokyo Olympics is almost zero, and the loss of tourism consumption caused by not accepting overseas audiences is expected to be more than 150 billion yen. The "Olympic boom" is obviously difficult to reproduce.
In fact, as early as the successful bid for the Tokyo Olympics in 2013, organizations calculated that the benefits from the Olympics only accounted for 0.7% of Japan's GDP.
The times have long been different. Japan's economy and society, which has developed into the post-industrial era, has long been highly saturated, and its various infrastructures have also been perfected. Naturally, the space for boosting economic income through the Olympics is limited.
For Japan, the economic significance of the Tokyo Olympics may have already declined, and the more important significance lies in boosting the confidence of the Japanese people after the earthquake.
When the world was raged by the epidemic, the Tokyo Olympics were given more connotations and became the hope of illuminating the "light at the end of the dark tunnel".
Data map: On July 23, the opening ceremony of the 32nd Summer Olympic Games was held at the New National Stadium in Tokyo, Japan.
The picture shows the lit main torch.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Han Haidan
Before the opening of the Olympic Games, the 138th plenary of the International Olympic Committee voted and agreed to add "more unity" after the Olympic motto "faster, higher, stronger". This is the Olympic motto after 108 years. First modification.
"We must adapt the Olympic motto to our times." As IOC President Bach said, under the epidemic, mankind needs to be "more united" to watch and help each other. On the Tokyo Olympics stage, athletes have profoundly interpreted the "more united". Olympic spirit.
"Heike Monogatari", the masterpiece of the Japanese Senki Monogatari, begins by writing, "The bell of Gion Shrine plays the sound of impermanence".
"Sense of impermanence" has been deeply imprinted in Japanese culture.
The Tokyo Olympics that came to an end after undergoing unpredictable changes in the world have finally withstood various tests, demonstrating the courage and ability of mankind to defeat the new crown epidemic.
From Tokyo 1964 to Tokyo 2020, more than half a century has passed. The two Tokyo Olympics have been quite different, but the same is that the Olympic spirit of mutual understanding, long-term friendship, solidarity and fair competition will be passed on forever. (Finish)