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have spoken only of the inherent weaknesses of centralised power. In the televised pictures and what those in the industry claim to be exceptional camera work we saw the true beauty of Beijing - very much not a Potemkin village - but that was only because more impoverished buildings were demolished and everything ugly was cleaned up. (But what Olympic venue city has ever showed off its ugly side? Vancouver 2010 will have its own significant challenge, there.) Media people travelled the city and the country, respecting guidelines but otherwise without restriction: because China wanted us to see it. In venues of 91,000 spectators, and another few thousands of athletes and support and staff and volunteers, not a single serious incident happened: and so there was far too permeating a security. Yet if anything violent had occurred, who would have been blamed but the inept security?

Even after the bombing during the opening ceremonies, Atlanta never had this public relations nightmare.

Maybe what we have chosen to forget is that the converse side of free speech is courtesy. When did we start waving around a freedom of speaking as though it ought to come with no restrictions of wisdom and restraint and even simple respect of the other?

The Chinese people were given guidelines how to cheer for opponents: and the result was certainly that every athlete was made to feel honoured, from the moment they first entered the Olympic village to ceremony and the playing of their national anthem. Each of the medal ceremonies was carefully sculpted to give the athletes their moment, and every one of the participants visibly showed pride in having been part of it. Even in the opening ceremony parade of athletes, there was a careful gap between the last of the other nations and the entry of the Chinese athletes: and so again we find that each, even the smallest, was given honour in their moment.

We saw some of the fallout in a cameraderie among the athletes, even the traditional macho posturing of the sprint, such as most of us have never seen. In the men's sprints our media placed the credit upon Usain Bolt; but who gets the credit in all the other events? Who gets the credit in the women's 110 hurdles, where the losers commiserate with the silver medalist for not having won gold, when the one who just discovered she just barely slipped into bronze in a photo finish and the one who just missed it instantly embrace and start jumping up and down in sheer happiness? In two cases

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