During my recent trip to Beijing, I realized that everyone who participates in the Paralympics is a winner.  

The 13th Paralympic Games was held in Beijing from September 6 to September 17. Over 4,200 athletes -- from six different disability groups -- from 148 countries took part in the 2008 Summer Paralympic Games.
“One World One Dream” was the theme of the 2008 Olympics and Paralympics, and we saw the slogan written on many walls in Beijing.  
China’s Hou Bin, a Paralympic gold medalist, climbed a rope to light the Paralympic flame during the opening ceremony at the National Stadium. Over 91,000 spectators silently gazed at him as he rose up and gave a glittering performance.  
The theatrical opening ceremony featured a 6,000-strong cast that included hundreds of disabled performers. The most memorable moment came when earthquake survivor Li Yue took center stage in a wheelchair to perform a “hand ballet” to Ravel’s Bolero.  
German photographer Steffen Berk told me that athletes generally participate in the Olympics for business, but nobody came to the Paralympics to make money, and the Paralympians were only thinking about sports.  
Disabled isn’t an acceptable word from now on. They can do almost everything, therefore they are able. Oscar Pistorious, the South African Blade Runner, surprised everybody at the Bird’s Nest.  
You had to be there.  
The Iranian sitting volleyball team and the Australian wheelchair basketball team were also amazing and both eventually won gold medals.
The world’s strongest man astonished everyone at the Paralympics. Iran’s new Hercules, Kazem Rajabi, lifted 265 kilograms, 1.5 kilos more than two-time Olympic gold medalist Hossein Rezazadeh’s world record in the clean and jerk, which he set at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens.
The Beijing Paralympic Games was a splendid sporting event in which athletes broke 279 world records and 339 Paralympic records.  
You had to be there.