Olympic Games an epic in the making
By Clay Latimer, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)
Published August 7, 2008 at 11:40 p.m.
Updated August 8, 2008 at 12:50 p.m.
Julie Jacobson © AP
Performers dance around a giant scroll at the stadium.
Olympics - August 8, 2008
The Olympic rings are lit during the Opening Ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics during a three-hour show at the iconic National Stadium, nicknamed the "Bird's Nest."
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China is ready for the big party.
An urban makeover for the ages is finished. Factories have been shut down to cut air pollution. Hostesses have worked on their smiles, taxi drivers on their manners.
Now, after seven years of meticulous preparation, the world's largest authoritarian state is rolling out the red carpet for 550,000 foreign visitors, 2.5 million Chinese tourists, 20,000 journalists and 13,000 coaches and athletes.
Every Olympics bills itself as an epic event, but this one lives up to the hype.
The 2008 Games are China's coming-out party as a 21st century superpower, a showcase for its 1.3 billion people and its culture, and the capstone to one of the most dramatic national turnarounds in human history.
During a 20-year struggle to host the Games, no task has been too complex, no detail too small for Communist Party leaders, who also hope to convince their own people they're ready to assume a place on the world stage.
"The world does not really know enough about China as we wish," Wang Wei, secretary general of the Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee, said earlier this year.
China has spent a reported $40 billion on new infrastructure and dazzling venues, $13 billion to improve the environment and untold billions in a state-run sports program that could overcome America during 17 days of competition at 37 locations.
A global television audience of a couple of billion will tune in Friday for the Opening Ceremonies, which features Chinese opera, a massive fireworks display and a mystery ending.
But the most scrutinized Olympics in history could turn into the most criticized if the government mishandles a crisis, which is why China's leaders reportedly just want it to be over.
In the past year, the country has been hit by the worst winter in decades, a catastrophic earthquake and flooding, rioting and even an invasion of green algae at the sailing venue.
But if the stakes are high, so are the rewards.
The 1964 Tokyo Olympics heralded the arrival of a new economic superpower from the ashes of World War II. The 1988 Seoul Olympics celebrated South Korea's journey from a developing nation to a modern power.
Paramilitary Games?
After promising a celebration of an open, modern China, Beijing has gone into armed-camp mode in recent weeks, with authorities warning of an urgent threat of violence and anti-government protest.
Security measures include surface-to-air missiles outside the main Olympic stadium, 100,000 anti-terrorist personnel and a half-million volunteers watching neighborhoods.
Combat aircraft, helicopters, warships, chemical-defense equipment and radar are on call.
The government has linked Beijing's 300,000 closed-circuit television cameras, including those in private apartment blocks, to a central system. Tickets are fitted with an electronic chip so owners can be tracked.
China even has reverted to public executions. Last month, the local government in Yengishahar province bused several thousand students and officeworkers into a public square, then lined them up in front of a vocational school to watch the execution of three prisoners. The men had been convicted of having connections to terrorist plots, which authorities said were part of a campaign aimed at disrupting the Olympics.
Critics claim China's rulers are desperate to avoid being embarrassed by protesters. But with foreign leaders such as President Bush planning to attend, others concede the measures are necessary.
Extreme makeover
First, there was the traditional architecture of imperial China, symbolized by the exotic, ancient Forbidden City. Then a wave of bland, boxlike Communist-era buildings. And now, a burst of dazzling, surreal architecture that rivals the great monuments of 19th-century Paris.
The spree of whimsical creation includes an Olympic stadium that looks like a bird's nest, a swimming venue that looks like it's built of bubbles, a pair of black office towers that lean toward each other at a 10-degree angle, and the largest air terminal in the world.
"The pyramids of the 21st century," professor Zhou Rong of Tsinghua University's architecture school told The Economist.
Cloud of suspicion
In April, Chinese Olympic leaders conducted a special "Environment Forum" to showcase their cleanup efforts to the International Olympic Committee.
The next morning, a thick blanket of smog hovered over the city, blackened clothes, seeped into homes, reduced visibility to less than 50 yards and forced the government to delay flights and shut major roads into the city. Children and the elderly were urged to stay indoors.
The IOC warned it might have to move or postpone some events because of the unhealthy air - a humiliating prospect for a country where saving face still matters.
China has relocated factories, seeded clouds, planted millions of trees, halted construction and dramatically limited traffic in recent weeks to clean up the air.
That hasn't reassured the athletes. Ethiopian marathon record-holder Haile Gebrselassie, who has asthma, will skip the marathon because of air-quality issues. Australia's track-and-field team announced it would skip the Opening Ceremonies, in part, because of pollution concerns.
Pollution, by the numbers
20of the world's 30 most polluted cities are in China.
He's everywhere
By becoming the first Chinese man to win a sprinting event in modern Olympics history, hurdler Liu Xiang became China's most famous athlete overnight - and the face of the Olympics. His 110-meter showdown with Cuban Dayron Robles will be a highlight of the Games.
Liu, arguably the most popular man in China, is handsome, charismatic and offers plenty of Western- style glamour to advertisers, which is why he's a fixture in commercials and on billboards and magazine covers.
To tap into the Chinese market, a record 63 companies have become sponsors or partners of the Beijing Olympics. Olympic-related advertising in China could reach $4 billion to $6 billion, according to a Beijing marketing-research firm. Liu will appear in ads for at least 16 companies, including Coke and Nike. Nike brand president Charlie Denson has compared him to Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods and LeBron James.
Superstitious matters
Eight is considered a lucky number, so the Games will kick off on 0 8/08/08, at precisely 8:08 p.m.
But some superstitions have taken on a darker tone, including the five cartoon characters chosen to represent Beijing during the Games - a giant panda, a Tibetan antelope, a flame, a fish and a swallow.
The panda supposedly foreshadowed the earthquake that devastated Sichuan province, where most of the world's wild pandas live.
The antelope foretold violent protests in Tibetan areas of China in March. The flame symbolized the protests that followed the Olympic torch around the world. The swallow foreshadowed the two trains that collided in an eastern Chinese province in April. Some believe the fish symbolizes a coming flood.
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August 8, 2008
6:13 a.m.
Suggest removal
danirobi writes:
Let the communist games begin!
August 8, 2008
7:26 a.m.
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LingLingfor_prez writes:
May team USA beat the communists at every level. Hopefully we get through the day, much going on in the world.
August 8, 2008
9:17 a.m.
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AngelontheSidelines writes:
Chinese nationalists are just as pathetic as pro war Bush loving kool-aid drinkers.
August 8, 2008
9:19 a.m.
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JustSayin writes:
Can the DenverNewsMonopoly be any more fawning and sycophantish in its coverage of something that is just starting right now?
August 8, 2008
9:39 a.m.
Suggest removal
SteveM writes:
This is all that needs to be said about the Authoritarian government of the USA...
"Police mistakenly raid Maryland mayor's house, kill his dogs 'for sport'"
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news...
police-mistakenly-raid-maryland-mayors-house-kill-/
remove space between to lines when following this ultra-long link from today's RMN.
August 8, 2008
10:13 a.m.
Suggest removal
HolierThanThou writes:
$40 billion is almost half what the USA spends on all highways, roads, and public transportation at all levels of government per year.
That's a lot of money to us but it's chump change to Communist China.
August 8, 2008
10:19 a.m.
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peter303 writes:
How does this compare to the 1936 German games? Germany was recovering from 15 years of terrible economic strife and looked like it was finally back on its feet again. But its ambitions did not stop at putting on a specular set of games- faer from it.
August 8, 2008
10:25 a.m.
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Michael writes:
Here is a link to a site which shows the GDP of all nations. As is shown, the GDP of the USA is almost $14 trillion. The GDP of China is $3.2 trillion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_...(nominal)
Holier - No matter how you slice it, the US has an economic output more than 4 times (400%) that of China. You're a moron.
August 8, 2008
10:47 a.m.
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Steph writes:
Wow, that POS Bushie knows how to wave a flag!
August 8, 2008
11:10 a.m.
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jugdish writes:
SteveM writes:
This is all that needs to be said about the Authoritarian government of the USA...
"Police mistakenly raid Maryland mayor's house, kill his dogs 'for sport'"
SteveM
What are you smoking up there in Boulder? How can you compare some incident in Maryland to brutal human rights abuses in China? It's pathetic. Thousands of innocent Chinese die in prisons everyday. In China you speak out against government and you disappear. Comparing that to some mistaken raid in Maryland is shameful.
Jugdish
August 8, 2008
11:10 a.m.
Suggest removal
HolierThanThou writes:
Hey Mikey,
Thanks, buddy! You helped my point! If we have such a huge GDP why are bridges collapsing and public transportation agencies cutting their budgets? Why all the poverty? Why is our government borrowing money from China to finance the lifestyles of our rich and famous?
Ever since Karl Rove left, Bush is having a terrible time trying to figure out why so many Americans can't stand him. I don't know. There's something about this picture that bothers me.
http://tinyurl.com/BushBeijing2008-jpg
August 8, 2008
12:27 p.m.
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HollyGoLightly writes:
I hope the Rocky Mountain News reads these comments. I think covering the Olympics is great but please, please, please do not put the winners with a photo on your website home page before we even have a chance to watch the broadcast! Allow a link to the blog and put photos there but some of us do not want to know the outcome prior to watching it on TV. This way those that want to know the outcome can click the link and read/view photos while those that want to see the broadcast can watch the excitement without knowing who won.
August 8, 2008
12:34 p.m.
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JSeifert writes:
War breaking out in eastern europe and all the rocky mountain news can talk about is China and the American Team wearing white Mao communist hats. No wonder We cower to China the Communist/Socialist have already taken over. The News black out on Russian agression and China's Human rights record, you know I always wondered why the News has a RED banner now I know.
We should have never gone to China and told the USOC if they go no more free rides no more money. We look the other way about Tibet and other countries that China has repressed and show them as some great country when all they are rich thugs no better then Drug cartels and the left does nothing but praise them like that's what we should be. This paper makes me Sick. I do not hear from you about reeducation camps, force abortions,forced labor to build the stadium or the way the press is Blacked out from the internet site or how Visa's are being denide because Americans belong to certain groups or religion NO the News kiss's China's feet and begs for more.