Paris Paralympic Games to open in City of Light

FRANCE 24 English

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00:00For more than a week now, the athletes have been getting their bearings.

00:04They're ready to show their prowess to the world.

00:08In total, 4,400 athletes are competing in the Paris Paralympic Games.

00:12A record 45% of them are women.

00:15Ten medal events have been added to give women and those with high support needs more visibility.

00:21We are role models, and I think that's so important for the next generation of the next little girl

00:26with, you know, outer legs or with whatever disability.

00:30And it's so important for the visibility to see what we're capable of as women and women with disabilities.

00:36A key means of raising awareness through representation,

00:39while also bringing joy to spectators and athletes,

00:42the events will occur across iconic sites in the French capital, as they did for the Olympic Games.

00:48The Château de Versailles is hosting the para-equestrian events.

00:52At the Grand Palais, there's para-fencing and para-taekwondo.

00:55At Les Invalides, it's para-archery.

00:58Some of the sites had to quickly switch out their decors.

01:01It's no longer beach volleyball at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.

01:04It's now blind football.

01:06In total, there are 22 Paralympic sports,

01:09and only two do not have an Olympic equivalent.

01:12They are boccia, which resembles petanque,

01:15and goalball, which requires total silence in the stadium

01:18so the visually impaired or blind players can hear the balls, which have bells inside them.

01:24It's a cord here, so this is what the athletes feel, so that they know the boundaries.

01:31While there are around half as many sports as during the Olympics,

01:34there are more medals.

01:36549 of them are up for grabs, compared to the 329 during the Olympics.

01:42This is because athletes are split up according to the kind and degree of their impairments.

01:46In total, 10 types of disabilities are taken into account.

01:50They're split over three categories, visual, physical and also cognitive impairments.

01:55Some two million spectators are roaring to go,

01:58to cheer the athletes on and to bask in the joys of sports for a little while longer.

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