Live updates: 2024 Olympics opening ceremony

At 6-foot-9, U.S. flag bearer and NBA icon LeBron James is pretty easy to spot. And there are no shortage of Olympians trying to find him at the Paris Games.

“I want to take a picture with a few guys from tennis and from NBA — LeBron James and Steph Curry,” Angola handball player and flag bearer Azenaide Carlos said.

Added Italian tennis player Sara Errani, when asked which athlete she wants to most meet: “LeBron James. Why? I don’t think there’s any need to add a reason, but for sure because I am a big basketball fan.”

James was selected in a vote among Team USA’s captains. Other nations use different methods for choosing flag bearers; Australia chef de mission Anna Meares revealed her nation’s picks — canoe-kayak Olympic champion Jessica Fox and field hockey’s Eddie Ockenden — earlier this week, and said James having the same honor piqued even more interest in the flag bearer role.

“There’s also a lot of excitement in the Australian team that LeBron James is their flagbearer,” Meares said.

Palestine’s entrance was met with cheers. Like many crisis-stricken nations, the country’s delegation is small and many of the athletes are Palestinian descendants or trained in other countries to be here.

Last but certainly not least, the French delegation has joined of the opening ceremony’s athletes’ parade.

It passed under the Austerlitz Bridge shortly after 9:15 p.m. to huge cheers from the rain-soaked crowd lining the riverbanks and watching from nearby apartment windows. Fans chanted “Allez les Bleus, Allez les Bleus” — a famed chant for the nation’s various sports teams.

Some people don’t want to leave the ceremony despite the rain and are trying to find cover so they can keep watching.

“I like the show, but I don’t want to be out in the rain for three hours,” said Guillermo Saez, who found shelter under a small bridge in the viewing area. “It’s unfortunate that it’s raining, it (the ceremony) was promising,” he added, noting that the French had bad luck.

More seats are being left empty along the parade route as the rain picks up in Paris. The athletes are still floating down the Seine, and many fans have still stuck around with umbrellas and ponchos.

A small delegation from Haiti is floating down the Seine. Like other crisis-stricken nations in the Olympics, many in the delegation are from other countries and have parents or grandparents that migrated from Haiti.

The Caribbean nation — a French and Creole-speaking country that shares a long, troubled history with France, its former colonizer — has largely become too dangerous for athletes to train there.

That said, for some in the delegation who spoke to the AP, representing their family’s country is a point of pride for a nation that has long been spoken down to.

Basketball player Dennis Schroder says it’s “insane” that he was picked to be Germany’s flag bearer. And he loved every second of it, with a big smile on his face as the boat carrying his team made its way down the River Seine.

“With my background as well, my mom’s from Gambia, me being dark skinned in Germany, been tough sometimes growing up but now to be able to represent Germany, it’s insane,” Schroder said. “It’s great for my family, not just for me, but people who have similar background. It’s a big, a huge, statement in Germany.”

Schroder, a member of Germany’s reigning World Cup champion team who plays for the Brooklyn Nets, is one of three flag bearers from the NBA in Friday’s opening ceremony. Greece’s Giannis Antetokounmpo and LeBron James of the U.S. are the others.

The weather is getting worse at the opening ceremony. And there’s now a new challenge: waves.

OK, they’re not enough for surfing, but if anyone in the athletes’ procession is prone to seasickness, here’s hoping they have a remedy nearby.

The boats are seeming to bounce on the Seine River a bit more than they did when the ceremony began — amid a break in the rain.

It’s been raining steadily for about a half-hour now. Most athletes have pulled transparent ponchos over their snazzy opening-ceremony outfits.

A small trickle of spectators have begun to file out of the ceremony. The vast majority of people continue to brave the rain.

The Olympic Refugee Team was met with huge cheers as it floated down the Seine.

In the lead up to the ceremony, a video showing graphics of people fleeing their countries cut over athletes running and boxing. It called on those watching the Olympics to support refugees. With dozens of athletes, this is the biggest Olympic Refugee Team since it was formed for the 2016 Games.

The team has also stirred controversy in some cases as countries like Cuba and Venezuela have complained, saying athletes from those countries should not be considered for the Games.

French-Malian pop star Aya Nakamura, the most listened-to French-speaking artist in the world, sang her hit “Djadja” accompanied by the orchestra of the French Republican Guard.

Nakamura likes to play with the French language and combine it with argot and expressions in English. She has been the target of a flurry of racist comments from the far right earlier this year when her name emerged as possibly participating in the opening ceremony. She received support from the Paris Olympics organizers and the French government.

Paris prosecutors in March said they were investigating into allegations of racist attacks against the singer

The boats with athletes were not the only ones on the Seine River during the opening ceremony. Fans who could afford hefty prices could watch the parade from party and restaurant boats docked along the river.

The “front-row” locations were the closest that fans could get to the parade.

Rain ponchos and umbrellas are out again in the stands as it continues to drizzle.

One man walked up to a volunteer asking: “Do you guys have ponchos to give out?”

Despite that, the mood in the stands is lively and people are dancing to music echoing over the river.

Fans in the sitting sections down the route of the opening ceremony had to watch the parade on large screens until the boats carrying the athletes arrived at their location.

The fans reacted to what they were seeing with claps and cheers. It rained during moments of the parade, prompting fans to take out their umbrellas and rain coats.

In case you’re wondering why the nations aren’t coming into the opening ceremony in alphabetical order, they are.

Sort of.

Greece, per Olympic tradition as the originator of the ancient games, almost always enters the ceremony first (the most recent exception was 2004, when it hosted the Athens Games).

The Refugee Team enters second now, and then it shifts to alphabetical order — that is, the French alphabet.

And the final three nations to enter the ceremony will have nothing to do with the alphabet. Australia goes second-to-last because it’ll host the 2032 Brisbane Games, the U.S. goes next to last because it’ll host the 2028 Los Angeles Games, and host France will be the final nation to hit the River Seine.

Singer and actress Lady Gaga performed a cabaret number on a golden staircase beside the Seine, emerging from behind pink feathers — an act pre-recorded and then shown on the television broadcasts.

Lady Gaga sang the French song “Mon truc en plumes” (“My thing in feathers”) by Zizi Jeanmaire. She was accompanied by 10 dancers and 17 musicians — all wearing costumes from House of Dior, which is owned by a major Olympic sponsor.

There are six Afghan athletes participating in the Olympics — three men and three women. According to the IOC, five are based outside Afghanistan while one is based in the country.

The Afghan National Olympic Committee, which was elected before the Taliban seized power, had to confirm that their athletes were not associated with the “de facto Taliban authorities of the country,” the IOC said.

As a giant plume of blue, white and red smoke in the colors of the French flag rose over the top of Austerlitz Bridge, it drew a huge roar from the crowd gathered along the riverbanks. Giant jets of water spurted up from the river as the Greek delegation — as always — was the first boat under the bridge and along the 6-kilometer (3.7-mile) route.

Among the 101 Greek athletes: basketball star Giannis Antetokounmpo, holding the country’s flag.

And away we go!

One of the most-watched television events in the world with an estimated 1.5 billion people set to turn in from all corners of the globe, has started in Paris.

Organizers say the show will last for about three hours, though if history is any guide that estimate is on the low side.

They’re not competing in these Olympics, but the opening ceremony has been graced by several Olympians past and present (Winter Olympians, for the latter) — along with the athletes-turned-entertainers covering the Games.

Dogs of all kinds, from as far away as the United Arab Emirates, have descended on Paris as part of security teams.

Some spectators came to the opening ceremony in their own colorful and creative outfits.

Clain Adelaïde of France wore a fake black mustache with upwardly curled ends, a beret and a French marinière in blue and white horizontal stripes.

“I want people to feel welcomed in France,” she said.

David Robbins and Katrina Blanca of San Antonio dressed as the Statue of Liberty. Robbins said it was Blanca’s idea to wear the costumes, but he was immediately on board.

“It’s perfect because it ties together both countries,” Robbins said.

From NBA superstars (Greece, the U.S.) to Syrian- and Cameroon-born refugees, hundreds of participating athletes will bear flags. Each Olympic committee named a pair of athletes (or in some cases, just one)