February 9, 1992

Eleven years in the planning, $1.6 billion in the spending, the XVI Winter Olympics opened today under crystal-clear skies, with a lavish cermony that was typically French and a political controversy that was typically American. For nearly two hours, an audience of 30,000 spectators in the world's largest temporary stadium, as well as millions watching on television around the world, were dazzled by screaming jet-fighter planes, strobe lights, fireworks and an entertainment pastiche that seemed to run the gamut of modern French culture.

Brian Williams is part of the great American dream. Born one of eight children in a poor black family whose father worked in the meat-packing houses here, he has scratched and struggled his way up to the point where now, at the age of 25, he holds a degree from Princeton University and runs his own printing company.

A Kilogram of Prevention The European Community is carefully scrutinizing what happens to the food it is sending to Russia, fearing that it will be diverted to the black market. Page 10. Fighting Smolders in Algeria After a day of carnage that is being called "bloody Friday" in Algeria, fighting continued between Muslim fundamentalists and Government security forces. Page 3. Tyson Cross-Examined Mike Tyson had some surly exchanges with the prosecutuor in his trial, but in his last day on the witness stand the boxer did not lose his composure. SportsSunday, section 8. Arrests in Queens Village Two men were arrested in the killing of two young girls when their Queens Village home was ransacked a week ago. Their baby sitter and another suspect are still at large. Page 36.

This small hamlet of donkey- and hand-plowed farmland is only five miles from the nearest paved road, but it takes 40 minutes to cover the rugged terrain by car. It is the kind of world to which most of the forcibly returned Haitian boat people must return. Here in Casale, a tiny pocket of green amid a rocky and forbidding badlands, residents are well acquainted with both poverty and political repression.

A STATION WAGON rolled into Norwich on a recent morning, carrying a team of consultants commissioned to rescue a dozen partially abandoned mills. The three visitors -- a preservation consultant, an architect and an architectural historian -- marveled at the city positioned at the confluence of the Shetucket, Yantic and Thames Rivers. "Just the way the whole town sits on the hills, overlooking three rivers, the topography of the town creates wonderful views," said Elena Kalman, an architect from Stamford. "Here is a town which, architecturally, has an incredible wealth of images and buildings -- the mills, houses and downtown -- and for some reason this town is totally underutilized."