Beijing Welcomes You

Two meters separate my bum and the red-carpeted podium where the world’s greatest cyclists will stand in two weeks with their jade-laden medals as their anthems are played and their flags raised to the rafters. I’m leaning against the ramp that leads down to the team rooms, the lockers. The Chinese cycling team is riding slow laps around the velodrome. They’re wearing the team racing suits, China red and yellow, and sporting iridescent colored sunglasses. A few are riding in pairs, others on their own. One is playing. He’s laughing as he climbs the steep 42˚ bank of the turn, then rides downhill and weaves near his teammates.

One of them glides off the track through the infield and whizzes by me. It’s just him and I on this end. We make eye contact and he smiles, “Ni hao,” he says softly. Another follows behind shortly. He seems interested in me sitting here alone with my computer. “Hello,” he says, and I reply with a, “Hi,” and a smile. They’ve been instructed by the government not to talk to the media until next week, so we can’t interview them. A salutation in passing is the most I could ask for, but I am still shocked by their friendly, outgoing spirits. Most of my fellow FQRs are downstairs studying the athletes on the computer, but I’ve found a bit of motivational serenity up here in the infield.

The past four days have streamed by in a blur that closely parallels these sprinters turning 60 kmh laps five feet from my perch. I see no details, just colors. We’ve been in to work everyday from 10:30 to 15:30. Tack on two hours for transportation each way, and you’re looking at a very full and exhausting day.

I am very, very pleased with our ONS team at the bicycle cluster. All of my supervisors are foreigners with the exception of one, so it is a pleasant feeling getting away from China a little bit everyday. Krystyna (ONS Manager, Aussie living in England) and Paul (Chinese Venue Manager) are directly in charge of us. Also on staff are two ONS Reporters who will write brief stories throughout the Games on cycling. Amy the Australian and Ernst the Dutchman keep us in line with their rigorous practice runs and “no BS, no excuses” mindset. We just met the American Andy, the Sports Info Specialist, today. He’s been in Paris covering the Tour de France and just got to Beijing yesterday.

It’s some kind of exhilarating to be on such an international team such as ours. It’s a nice break to get away from the Chinese ways, but also to not fall custom to our American habits. Cycling is the perfect sport to be covering because it is not so familiar to me as American football or basketball, but it is also not a Chinese stronghold. It’s something in between. It’s international. It’s the essence of Olympism, and it has become an invigorating subject to learn about.

I think my days spent so far in the velodrome have given me great perspective on the magnitude of the Olympics. This place is truly unbelievable. I am sitting in the middle of the track. I AM SITTING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE OLYMPIC VELODROME. I am sitting next to the medal stand underneath the flag-raising bar that’s just begging for the first medalist’s flag to be attached to it, and the first cyclist I meet smiles and nods and greets me to his country. His warm smile and dark eyes that glisten when he looks up say it all.

Today to me and tomorrow to the world, the message is loud and clear: Beijing Welcomes You.

XOXO

Cycling Schedule Up

I posted a schedule of the cycling events with dates and times on the right side. I'm going to get a cycling preview up soon so you can all start learning about the disciplines and athletes. You've all got to keep up with my knowledge as I become a cycling expert!

A dress rehearsal for the opening ceremony occurs each night from now until August 8. Leroy won a drawing at work today that gave him a ticket to tonight's run-through. He told us a few details, and it sounds absolutely AWESOME. Although I was/am super jealous of his luck, I am really glad he went and was able to share it all with us. I can't wait to see the show on the 8th on TV!

Two long phone conversations and Leroy's account of the ceremony prohibited me from a solid post tonight. Sorry, fans! Check out the videos and photos, though. They've been updated!

XOXO

Beijing Belly

We have made light on several occasions of what we like to call the "Beijing Belly." I'm sure I've mentioned multiple times about how unforgivingly humid and sweaty it is here in China, and the locals have not adapted a whole lot better than anyone else. What to do about this? Beijing Belly, of course.

Beijing Belly is displayed in many public places and is utilized by all walks of life. To pull off the perfect look, men should roll their shirts up from the bottom, tucking the extra material upwards against their chest. This allows the perfect amount of air circulation around the midsection which enables perspiration droplets to evaporate without saturating the clothing. The ingenious Beijing Belly is sported by men of all ages here in the city, but I have yet to see any women attempt the style. However, if it gets any sweatier, I might have to be the trend setter.

The Beijing Belly

On a different note, my training has been in full swing since Monday. We have been enduring the 1 hour 45 minute-long subway/hiking trek to and from the Laoshan Bicycle Cluster each day with seemingly all 16 million of Beijing's finest. Yes, I have my uniform. No, I don't have pictures up, yet. You will have the opportunity to hear all about it as soon as the weekend comes, I promise. In the meantime, please enjoy the lighter commentary as I catch some Zzz's for tomorrow's work day.

XOXO

Clean Sheets Day

Monday is Clean Sheets Day here at the CUC. It's the most glorious day of the week, and as Andrea will attest, I look forward to it very, very much. I probably mention Clean Sheets Day or the countdown to it at least once per every dirty sheet day.

The maids come every morning, very similar to a hotel housekeeping service. There is a maid "quarters" of sorts on each floor where they hang out during the day, watch TV, and do their thing. Andrea found out quickly that they also keep a plunger on hand down there. That was how we learned that in China the toilet paper does not get flushed down the throne. Put it in the trash bin next to the seat, and there will be no need for the "tou lah."

On a daily basis, the maids change our garbage cans, toss some chemicals in the toilet, and take a quick mop to the floor. They also restock toilet paper, if necessary. On Mondays, however, they really deliver the goods.

When we arrived the first night, our beds were made with a fitted sheet, a pillow, and a comforter covered with a white duvet. I never thought anything of it until the following Monday when the maid came in. I was peacefully asleep under my covers when one of the maids shook my knee to wake me. I was startled, and didn't understand her grabbing at my bed sheet and motioning to me. I waved her off, thanking her in Chinese for the gesture.

She shrugged and moved on to Andrea's bed. I laid three feet away watching them strip the one next to me and re-sheet it in about 30 seconds. They folded the blanket and stacked it with the pillow at the head of the bed.

At that moment, I prayed that they would return in the afternoon to finish my side. Clean sheets are right up there on my favorite little-things-that-make-a-huge-difference list. They never returned, and since that day, I have been counting my blessings for Mondays.

When I got home from a long and sweaty day of training at the velodrome, the sheets welcomed me with open arms. I showered and haven't left them since.

I love Clean Sheets Day.

XOXO

Shopped til I Dropped

Sunday was my last day off for awhile. It appears that my Beijing vacation has actually come to an end, as I work everyday this week. What a tragedy! With our final moments of freedom, a few of us hit the shopping scene pretty hard.

First we set out to the Wangfujing area with the high-class Oriental Mall. At the Nike store, I plagued with myself over a pair of Team USA basketball uniform shorts for my little brother's souvenir. They were ¥398, or about $60. I was flabbergasted! In my three weeks in China, I have learned many things. One of most aortic lessons, though, is that nothing costs more than ¥100. If there's a product that's priced upwards of the century mark, I really stop and think about the purchase.

While I realize that authentic uniforms are higher priced, I can't justify spending the money. Gus really wants official Team USA goods, but I've come to grips with the fact that the US stuff is going to be at US prices. I'm really not ready to pay US prices for anything. Needless to say, the basketball shorts got passed up. Sorry, Gus, but your team garb is going to have to wait. Instead, you get a ¥15 Chinese "Red Power" shirt.

Later in the Hong Qiao Pearl Market, Megan and Andrea showed me the ropes in jewelry buying. I came home with three necklaces, four bracelets, and a pair of earrings for myself and very little for anyone else. If you're worried, don't be. Not everything there was pearls, and not everything there was expensive. But... you are going to have to wait and see on my purchases :)

Check souvenir shopping off the list.

XOXO

Le Tour de Beijing

What's a trip to Beijing without risking my life on a bicycle in the busy city streets? That's precisely what I thought, so Leroy, Andrea, Megan and I tore off to make it happen. After some bad directions from the National Geographic guidebook, we found ourselves wandering through Bai Hai Park. Eventually we found our way out and hunted down a bicycle rental man. Just a single ¥200 yuan deposit for four bikes and we were off to explore.

I ducked and dodged and cutoff cars and buses like a true Beijinginite on a bicycle. Through hutongs, on sidewalks, around taxis, and down stairs we rode. We laughed and sweated more than we have all month. I weaved across a six-lane road in front of two-way traffic and barely beat a quick moving taxi to a spot in the intersection. I had Megan panicked that I wasn't going to make it out alive. I was in the mood, in the moment, in Beijing. I was having the time of my life!

We went nowhere and everywhere all at once. A stop for lunch let us collect our thoughts while we sat in the air conditioning for a bit. I ate a "chicken ball in chili sauce," and NO, it wasn't a testicle, nor was it chili sauce. Nonetheless it was delicious, and I mean it. We were back in the open air in no time, riding like the wind. Most of Beijing's roads are equipped with heavily used bike lanes. The bicycle traffic might be more intense than its motorized cousin. Wrong ways, one ways, skinny gaps between buses and cars and pedestrians, and intersections are never an obstacle. The Tour de Beijing it certainly was.

XOXO

USA via International Eyes

Just when I'm settled on the decision that China is weirdest, most back ass-wards place in the world... I flip on channel 12 CCTV International, the only English-speaking channel we get.

"In the American city of San Diego this weekend is the Comic Book Convention," reports the announcer. I look up from uploading my photos just in time to catch a woman dressed head-to-toe as Catwoman and playing the part. In the clip, she pounces in front of a little boy at the convention, scaring the living daylights out of him. She proceeded to lick her "paws" while haunching on all fours.

The 30-second bit goes on to show all walks of Americans dressed up as their favorite comic book characters, walking around San Diego pretending to be superheros and villainous crooks. After battling to survive in Beijing for three weeks, I saw my home country for the first time from a different perspective.

In an instant I decided that while China might be backwards, San Diego has really got a screw loose.

XOXO

"The difference between loving it and hating it is knowing the language." -An expat we met on the subway

Lauren, Traci & I at the airport this morning at 4:45am. We thought the matching, official-looking garb and credentials would help us pull some strings at the airport... but it didn't quite work out that way.

Bomb-sniffing dogs scour each bag that comes inside Beijing’s Peking Capital Airport as of July 20. As I sit here in reflection of my past, hellacious 24 hours, I can see two or three what appear to be cocker spaniel mixes at each door. To clarify, we’re NOT talking about the security you must pass through to enter a boarding gate. Every person entering the airport from the outside must be searched for explosives. At the doors without dogs, crews of Chinese security officials pick through each purse and bag with white gloves. Before letting anyone pass, bags are wiped with a special cloth that is then scanned for explosive residue, i.e. gunpowder. Each visitor also walks through a metal-detector.

Once you’re inside, there’s a lovely little café overlooking a slew of entryways. Here I sit this Friday morning watching the crowds go by. You probably wonder how exactly I wound up at the airport this early morning. A complicated and not so interesting story it is, but the facts are as follows.

A day at work resulted in another five days off, so a small group of us got adventurous to visit the city of Shanghai, the NYC of China. We book flights from a cheap Chinese booking website that came recommended from some Chinese friends. None of us have ever booked a domestic flight in another country, nor have we booked a flight less than 36 hours before it was set to take off… but what the heck, we’re in China! Let’s do it! I throw down my credit card and passport to one point person without even thinking. She books the flights with little to no issues, and we’re Shanghai’ed Friday through Sunday.

Drama ensues Thursday morning when the point person wakes up to TWENTY-TWO text messages from the booking agency… all of them in Mandarin. Three of our five passengers flights are screwed up. We call and talk and call again. They speak English, but not well enough to discuss a complicated issue. We speak Chinese to the extent of “Hello,” “Thank-you,” “Too expensive,” “I don’t understand,” and, “Communication University of China.”

Bottom line is this: due to the language barrier, we were not able to communicate our needs to the booking agency. Therefore, I got up this morning at 3am, trekked it to the airport, and made it just in time to cancel my flight and receive a respectable refund. I wasn’t dealing with it anymore. The mini-vacation was too expensive for me to embark upon without the comforts of a larger group, and the draw to Shanghai for me was not as magnetic as that of others in the group. Lauren and Traci were off for the “Paris of the East” this morning at 7:30am, while I was hitting Starbucks in the airport for some comfort frappuccino and quiet reflection time.

So let us briefly discuss this massive language barrier that goes beyond the wordly world and delves deep into the realm of charades and cartoon drawings on notepad paper. So far in China, there is no way around this “Great Wall.” Not only can we not speak Chinese words, but are also unable to repeat them back when someone dictates them to us. I have concluded after three weeks of trying that my tongue does not move in the way that it must to formulate Mandarin dialects.

So what is the solution? Drawings? Hand motions? Acting things out? All have failed miserably time and time again. I drew this lovely sketch of McDonald’s, the world-renowned (or so we thought) gold arches with the Chinese word meaning “yellow” (drawn by hand in a manner that a 3-year old would laugh at, no doubt), and a box of French fries with an “M” in hopes of telling anyone on the streets of Beijing that we were hungry for some McDonald’s the other day at 5am after watching the flag raising at Tian’anmen Square. No luck. People stared and stared at my drawing, looking back at me like I was a fool. It wasn’t until we ran into a nice old man who spoke some English that we learned there was a McDonald’s within walking distance.

This language wall is unbreakable, unscalable, and completely unbearable. We’ve resorted to pointing at pictures taken on our cameras of the things we want. Even with this fairly successful method, our navigation abilities are quite limited. This brings me back to the reason I’m in the airport right now watching bomb-sniffing dogs violate the personal belongings of those making routine stops at Peking Capital. I climbed a fence, hailed a taxi, and fought through airport confusion this morning to find out that I couldn’t cancel or transfer my flight through the airline. In fact it was never that difficult at all! All I had to do was call the company I purchased it from (the Internet booking agency) and ask to cancel my reservation. At 7am I spoke with the only English-speaker on staff, and she took care of the issue in seconds. I received a refund and a, “Have a nice day, ma’am!”

--POST BREAK--
--The rest of this happened upon leaving the airport this morning--

As I strolled out of the airport to hail a taxi, I held the elevator door open for a girl who was running to catch it. She thanked me in English! I asked her if my card from the dorm I'm staying in had the words, "Communication University of China" written in Chinese characters, as obviously I could not read it. She confirmed, and when I showed excitement in that I would be able to point and communicate with the cabbie, she seemed concerned. "You are going to CUC?" she asked, "We have a bus!"

Long story real short... I rode home from the airport FOR FREE with a bus load of Chinese folks headed my way. Picture me, in the orange shirt above, on a bus FULL of Chinese people all wearing the same blue uniform and khaki pants.

Glory be to China.

XOXO

Some Serious Grubbin'

To answer the question that many of you have been plaguing me with since my teaser-post... NO, I did not participate in the eating of this stuff. I went along to witness and provide photo/video documentation. My mother already fed me a lecture about how I can't come home without trying and doing it all... blah, blah, blah... so my roommate Andrea vowed that she wouldn't let me leave Beijing without eating something gross at the market. We'll see how long that lasts :)

The Beijing Night Market can be read about in any number of Beijing "Must See" publications. It's essentially a strip of street vendors selling a whole slew of exotic foods, from strange animals to weird body parts to beer kept cold by a chunk of dry-ice. Everything is mounted raw onto a stick in a fashion that's eerily similar to worming a fish hook. Each specimen is carefully arranged on the counter in styrofoam platters which collect run-off liquid. The marketeers holler at throngs of participants and onlookers in hopes of winning the attention and business of any passerby. The menu consists of every gross thing you can imagine, plus all the nastiest stuff you've never thought of. We questioned the edibility of many items, but mis compadres were feeling very adventurous. We followed the adrenaline while we had it.

Each item is seasoned and cooked over fire after it's ordered. You can order it without spice, but for the most part, you really need the spice if you expect to choke down the food. The crew gagged on silkworms in the beginning, but by the end they were venturing to new booths on their own and returning with weirder and weirder items. Make sure you check out the videos by following my link to the right to see the real details.

Andrea nibbles on a sheep testicle. Later she described it as, "...Exactly the texture and taste you might expect from a testicle!"


The snake unravels into Jason's mouth; he said the skin was very tough.


Lauren appeared out of nowhere with this sea urchin. Traci thought her spoonful tasted like boogers.


Traci displays the first item on the menu: sugared fruit and beer... to get us in the mood.


The Night Market near Wangfujing Street.


Jason's shocked that he just ate sheep's testicle, lamb's penis, and fried silkworm.


Lauren dives head-first into a lamb's penis.

On a different note, check out this YouTube video made by our Aussie friends of trip highlights thus far. I'm featured for all of 3 seconds!! The Jing is Tai Gui La!

XOXO

Chinese Karaoke

I’ve always heard that the Chinese take their karaoke VERY seriously. On Sunday night, I found out just how serious they are. For the first time, nearly all of our Purdue group hit the bars together in search of the world’s best karaoke. We stumbled upon a little dive just outside the campus walls with a big neon “KTV” sign, signifying that we had in fact arrived.

The welcoming host escorted us down a little hallway to a room with a large flat screen TV on one wall and one long couch wrapping around each of the other three walls. Two wired microphones lay patiently on the coffee table in the middle. A round of beer was ordered, and then another, and another…

Jason and Val hit the stage first to belt out a horrible Chinese version of the Backstreet Boys’ hit Larger than Life. Everyone followed suit, and before I knew it there was a waiting list for the microphone!

Chad & Alysha serenade each other

Though we were really looking forward to watching the townies light up the karaoke stage, we did have a fantastic time in our private room with cold beer on delivery! After several beers, we really delighted in the corny Chinese remakes of our favorite outdated-but-memorable Western songs. Check out these photos of the background video from Destiny’s Child’s Say my Name.

XOXO