Salt Lake City (Don’t Tell Anybo ? The Winter Olympics got under way Friday night with a spectacular and very cold opening ceremony featuring some of the world’s top entertainment artists, including country artist LeAnn Rimes, R&B artist R. Kelly, pop artist Sting, hip-hop artist Yo “Yo” Ma and art artist Vincent van Gogh.

These artists wowed the crowd by almost perfectly synchronizing their lip movements with recordings of themselves, although at one point Miss Rimes’ lip gloss froze and bonded her mouth shut, forcing her to finish lip-syncing her song via hand puppet.

The only other glitch came when a technical foul-up forced the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, which was supposed to perform a medley of inspirational songs, to instead lip-sync “Who Let the Dogs Out.” But they pulled it off beautifully, because that is the kind of tabernacle artists they are.

The Opening Ceremony also featured a huge ice rink, on which 800 ice skaters did a synchronized routine that was hindered only slightly by the fact that they had to perform barefoot, because their skates could not go through the metal detector.

The added security was necessary because the ceremony was attended by President Bush, or somebody who looks a lot like him. Vice President Cheney also made a brief appearance in the form of a hologram.

Without question the most spectacular moment was the lighting of the Olympic Flame. As usual, the details were kept “top secret” until the last minute, when the Olympic torch entered the stadium and, in a dramatic climax that brought a roar of approval from the crowd, ignited a 25-foot-high stack of Enron executives.

But the most meaningful (in the sense of longest) part of the ceremony was the Parade of Athletes, in which competitors from many nations marched around the stadium and stood together, reminding us that the true meaning of the Olympics is international understanding, which means not making fun of foreign people because they have funny names.

Among the Olympic athletes whose names we should not find amusing are (I am not making these up): Momo Skokic, Assen Pandov, Angel Pumpalov, Radek Bonk, Meelis Aasmae, Marku Uusipaavalniemi, Dagny L. Krisjandottir, Gatis Guts, Ganbat Jargalanchuluun, Frode Estil, Irina Slutskaya, Peter Pen, Beat Hefti, Miroslav Satan, Assol Slivets and, of course, Picabo Street.

Speaking of which, the streets of Salt Lake City are teeming with helpful Olympic volunteers, who constantly ask you if they can help you, and then, whatever you want to do, helpfully inform you that, for security reasons, you cannot do it. On a more positive note, it turns out that, contrary to the rumors, you can get beer here. All you have to do is ask. And then take a simple blood test. Then you must fight the giant snake.

No, really, it’s no big deal to get a beer. Unfortunately, because of strict Utah laws, the beer has roughly the same alcohol content as Yoo-Hoo. The press corps is finding that it must consume massive quantities before it is prepared to face the biathlon competition. I mention this not for personal reasons, but because I believe that it will be of widespread general interest to whoever reviews my expense account.

But never mind the finances. The important thing is, the games have begun. Soon the mountains will echo with the traditional Olympic cheer:

“Radek Bonk, he’s our man! If he can’t do it, Ganbat Jargalanchuluun can!”

Dave Barry is a columnist for The Miami Herald.