scott wrote:the order the countries came out was not, as is typical, in alphabetical order. they said this is because Chinese does not have an alphabet. rather, they went in order by the number of brushstrokes required to write the Chinese character for the name of the country.
regardless, it's quite irrelevant.
You are correct but NBC changed the order so that the U.S. was shown at the end in order to retain more viewers through the whole ceremony. You can see team U.S. in some of the shots before they were shown entering the stadium.
And, yes, completely irrelevant.
"To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost."
-Gustave Flaubert