By Catherine Bremer

Catherine works in the Reuters bureau in Mexico City covering politics and general news and was sent out to help with the Beijing Olympics coverage.

When I was told I was going to be part of a front-row team of reporters covering the Olympics opening ceremony I felt a rush of excitement -- followed by the adrenalin of pure terror.

Aside from finding the words to describe a staggeringly complex visual event that 91,000 spectators and a billion TV viewers are watching with you, our chief worry was the risk of missing a security threat or protest in the cavernous Bird's Nest stadium, or not spotting one of the 14,000 performers tripping over.

We were half a dozen correspondents at the desks set up for Reuters in the front row, with a handful of others scattered elsewhere in the stadium.

Once we'd got over our disbelief at being there, rifled through our bags of Olympic freebies, taken some photos of each other and let out whoops of relief that the laptop cables into the Reuters editing system worked fine, we set about counting how many pairs of eyes we had.

It didn't matter how many dozens of Reuters people were going to be monitoring the event on television, the price for getting to be there on the night was the pressure of knowing there would be no excuses for us missing anything.

We joked about whether we'd be able to spot one athlete in the parade making a "Free Tibet" sign, or a wisp of smoke on the far side. But the stress was overwhelming, and only partially relieved by the constant exclamations of joy by our effusive chief prose writer as the clock counted down to showtime.

When the show kicked off right in front of our noses, I think all of our jaws dropped open. It truly was the most incredible experience, and not at all easy to put into words. We touch-typed like crazy, not daring to take our eyes off the spectacle, then frantically compared notes on the best way to phrase things.

I held my breath when Li Ning was doing his daredevil mid-air run around the stadium rim to light the torch. And I was sad when it was all over -- but ever-so-slightly relieved too.

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