By now it is perhaps too late to make the decision to come to see the olympics. Preparations have been underway for years, and people who have booked tickets in advance are now happily occupying your seats at the watercube. Getting yourself a plane ticket and a few event tickets may be too expensive. But if you have the time, and the money, you had better come.

It has been widely said that the Olympics are China's coming-out party. If this is true, and it must be if we all believe it, then the opening ceremony is the anticipated beginning of this party. I am privileged and very honored to have been able to see it in rehearsal.

Of course it is a show like a movie, or like live theatre. It is meant overwhelm you, and to best showcase a brilliant and thriving culture. But suspension of disbelief is effortless, and from there you can't help but begin to understand.

There were moments at the beginning, in the semi-darkness, seeing ideas made real, which brought tears to our eyes. Watching thousands of people move in patterns and waves, structured and timed on a scale seldom seen, strength and beauty is revealed.

On the surface this inspiration is beautiful, and underneath the surface we can see a currents of the future. Coreography often represents the best intentions of the age: from ancient times, dance has evolved with modes of social order. In its expression of the moment it is a microcosm of an age. In ancient times we could see the vigour and turmoil of life, in more recent periods structures evolved that mirrored the faceted rigours of feudal, and then urban life. Ballet and modern dance entered to show the beauty and grace possible in urban life. We now see orchestrated on a huge scale, the effect of modern technologies and practices of thinking on the choreographies of the opening ceremony of the 2008 Olympic games.

The artifacts of modern life and communication are ever present and become structural elements in the coreography: there is inspiration from addressable systems, digitized patterns, things like LED signs. Dancers become a variety of large multi-dimensional television made up of small individual lights and objects, moving and still. Together they create a mosaic of images, motion and patterns when seen from distance. This inspiration can be seen in the ordering of dancers into a spatial pattern, and then using the pattern to embody structures and images.

What we as the audience see and understand however, is perhaps quite different from what the host of this party sees. We see the aggregated patterns and movements of thousands of people, who are moving supported by the efforts of thousands more, and millions, and millions more. This is a highly supported endeavor, this moment when billions of eyes follow the movements of those who have prepared and been supported by friends and families spanning one of the largest nations, in no small way, represents the hope of the entire country of China .

The truth is that though it is a show, it is absolutely real, and enduring. It has changed everything it touched, and it will change you if you participate.

If you come to the Olympics, you will see something that will change your life. There is strength, organization, confidence, hope, and ability. These are just the things that are so often lacking in other parts of the planet.

It is a humanist endeavor, in the heart of the most populous nation on earth.

China has taken a lot of bad press from western countries. Don't believe the hype. Of course China resents this bad press greatly, it doesn't yet have a lot of experience with unspinning western spin. There is also a variety of modesty that is unique to Asia that the west repeatedly violates without noticing. China is a very proud country. Just as western people genuinely don't understand Chinese ideas, Chinese people genuinely do not understand western ideas and attitudes. But, though there are different sides to the planet, there is not a right and a wrong side.

Take this as a road into the future. This is your entry point. After this there is no going back. The world has changed. Come see what it looks like now.

Author: Alyssa