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HT - Athens Coverage

Check out: Olympics 2004: HindustanTimes.com

The city of Athens and the Greeks gave a fitting welcome home party to the Olympic Games by kicking off the 28th edition of the multi-sport extravaganza in grand style and with lot of pomp and pageantry in a glittering Opening Ceremony at the Olympic Stadium on Friday.

The spectacular opening, showcasing the world-renowned Greek history and art, from a modern approach with the help of the latest technological advances, was enacted in front of 72,000 spectators and an estimated global audience of four billion people.

Close to 9,000 artists and support staff enchanted the watching multitude of people with a kaleidoscope of light, special effects and pyrotechnics as the Games, held in Greece after more than 100 years and for only the second occasion in the modern era, were declared open.

The grand Opening Ceremony was the apt signal of the return of the Games to the country where they were born in 776 BC and hosted the first modern Games in 1896 after they were revived by the selfless efforts of France's Baron de Coubertin in Athens.

Among the famous artists who performed at the fabulous Opening Ceremony was DJ Tiesto. He performed his DJ-set live for close to an hour-and-a-half regaling the audience with new tracks produced especially for the Opening and songs composed to encapsulate the spirit of the Ceremony.

The ceremony was, in a way, a telling riposte after years of uncertainty during the build-up to another grand moment in the history of the country.

The Grecian capital won the right to stage the 2004 event in September 1997 at the 106th IOC session in Lausanne by edging out Rome in the final round of the vote.

But construction work fell behind schedule, much to the consternation of IOC which had to deliver a strict warning before the city buckled up and made a serious effort to prove its detractors wrong, and finally succeeded in its endeavour.