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8/12/2008 |
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OLYMPICS 2008 |
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Tuesday, August 12
Well I did go to the venue I heard about where people are either turning in tickets they won't use, or by a certain time tickets in "will call" are not picked up. It turns out that people are hanging around hawking tickets. So I did pick up some basketball tickets for Saturday. I am not sure who is playing...it may be Jamaica vs. Luxembourg, but at least I will get to see the basketball arena which is supposed to be a great Olympic building. I have some tickets to the track events, so I will get to see the Bird's Nest. Now I just need to snag some swimming tickets so I get to experience "The Cube."
Today meetings took me from one end of the city to another. Bouncing all around Beijing it is remarkable to take in all of the Olympic decorations. Banners by the thousands line the streets, buildings wrapped in 10 story ads, flowers, flowers and more flowers, buses with signage, taxis with signage, and of course tourists with every possible Olympic clothing imaginable. Hotels have landscaped with Olympic colored and shaped flowers and shrubs. Bridges are decorated with Chinese lanterns and Olympic emblems. You cannot look in any direction in any part of the city without seeing a picture of Yao Ming.
Though I had heard that the hotels had a high vacancy rate, I tend to doubt that. Every hotel I have visited since the games began is bustling with Olympic activity. Traffic is much improved over normal conditions. We are on the odd/even last digit of the license plate and I think it is working. I do not feel I have been stuck in a traffic jam downtown in days. Under normal conditions you can spend hours stuck in traffic.
Today was one of the better days for air quality. Partial blue skies all day. That was nice. At lunch today the restaurants with sidewalk eating were packed. Every one was enjoying the sun even though it was a bit hot and humid.
Tomorrow I have another busy day with meetings, but my friend Brad Thomas comes in tomorrow night and my son Ben comes in Friday night. So after tomorrow I will get more into the Olympic stride and begin making the trek to where the action is.
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posted time 10:05:49 AM |
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