2010 Asian Games opening ceremony

The 2010 Asian Games opening ceremony officially began at 8:00pm China Standard Time (UTC+8) on November 12, 2010. The ceremony took place along the Pearl River on Haixinsha Island, mark it the first time in history that the ceremony was held outside the stadium. In front of 30,000 spectators, it lasted four hours, featured about 6,000 performers, with at least 40,000 of fireworks. The ceremony was choreographed by Chen Weiya (陈维亚), who was assistant director to Zhang Yimou in 2008 Summer Olympics opening ceremony.

Prior to the opening ceremony, athletes and officials from 45 National Olympic Committees (NOC) were paraded by boat around the Pearl River with distance of 9.3 km to showcase the Cantonese culture.

After the countdown, the opening began with firework displays at Canton Tower and around Haixinsha Island. Afterwards eight honour guards of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) received the flag of the People's Republic of China from two children and raised it up, accompanied by the national anthem March of the Volunteers.

The artistic section, dubbed "Sailing" (启航) began at 8:06pm. The beginning saw a drop of water shown on eight giant retractable screens followed by a boy sat in a giant leaf slowly descending from the sky. By this time the centre stage was flooded with water and the men on horseback rode onto the arena.

The next portion "Water of the Earth" (大地之水) saw dancers perform and form a series of flowers. Initially five smaller flowers were formed before eventually the performers came together to form one big flower bloom. Children dancers then came out with lanterns followed by neon light dancers.

...
Wikipedia