Olympic Games 2004

The Athens Olympics of 2004 was one of the best Olympics ever made, and as the President of the IOC said was the Unforgettable Dream Games. The Athens Olympics create a new world record that of the Volunteers ,160.000 of Olympic Volunteers from all over the world came to Athens and help in many fronts during and before the Games.

The Olympic Summer Games 2004 took place from 13 to 29 August 2004 in Athens. After the first Olympic Games of the modern era 1896 and the unofficial matches between 1906, it was the second time Athens hosted the Olympic Games.

Athens was voted as the hosting capital of the 2004 Olympics in 1997 , among other countries that had participated in the International Olympic Committee session of 1997, that was held in Lausanne, was Buenos Aires, Cape Town, Stockholm, and Rome. During this time the IOC president was Juan Antonio Samaranch and the general administration of the Athens Olympics had Gianna Angelopoulou-Daskalaki. The preparations and constructions of new stadiums, roads, the Olympic Village the transformation of the OAKA roof from the famous Spanish architect Calatrava etc started in the year 2000 .

Among the largest construction projects in Athens was:

• the Athens metro,
• the Attica highway,
• the new Airport in Spata and
• the tram.

Many have thought that Athens wont be ready for the Olympics of George Synodinos in OAKA at the Athens 2004 Olympics2004 but the enormous and well organised efforts of the Greek government managed Athens to be ready at the right time for one of the best organised games in the History of the Olympic games. On 10 August 2004, the Tuesday before the opening, was a ticket sales record with 88.317 tickets. The Opening ceremony was a dream the Athens Olympic stadium was packed with more then 80.000 audients. The president of the Greek republic Stefanos Stefanopoulos walked to the stage with Gianna Angelopoulou-Daskalaki and a small child to announce the beginning of the XXVIII Olympiad.