2004 Summer Olympics opening ceremony the Opening Ceremonies, for example in the last Olympics before that, in Salt Lake City, where banners of the previous 18 Winter Olympics entered Rice-Eccles Stadium at the beginning of the ceremony. This would also be seen in Vancouver during the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Winter Olympics and on the Televised version of the Olympic Opening Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games. The first speech came from Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki, the chief organizer of the Athens 2004 Olympics and the first female chief organizer of an Olympic games. She told the athletes: "Welcome home!" and "Greece is standing before
2009 East Asian Games opening ceremony 2009 East Asian Games opening ceremony The 2009 East Asian Games opening ceremony was held on December 5, 2009 at Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong. The opening began at 8pm at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre on a floating stage set up at Victoria Harbour. The production team was the same one that ran the 2008 Beijing olympics opening ceremony. The ceremony involved 44 decorated vessels and cost HK$40 million (about US$5 million) to stage, lasting 90 minutes. Tickets to the opening ceremony was sold at HK$1000. Special guest People's Republic of China State Councilor Liu Yandong is first introduced.