Shanghai Surprises: Our Olympic Experience

The Olympics are over (sniff, sniff). Since this was the first time we have had the opportunity to watch the events from outside the US, it was really interesting to get a different perspective on everything. And of course, this being China, the Olympics were the topic of conversation all the time, everywhere we went. There were screens set up on the streets where people could watch the games and I even noticed that there were TV's on some local buses which were broadcasting it as well. The other day I got into a taxi and the driver was listening to a broadcast of swimming- play by play- or should I say stroke by stroke- of the events. I just couldn't imagine people in the US listening to swimming on the radio. My parents actually attended the opening ceremonies and a few of the events in Beijing. They couldn't get over the fact that every resident of Beijing was so excited and happy about the Olympics. From the street cleaners, taxi drivers, and sales clerks to the 100,000 volunteers- everyone had a smile on their face. And the most amazing story of all- my parents met a Chinese woman in Beijing who was 102 years old. She and her grandson had traveled 36 days (by bike) to get to Beijing for the Olympics. He rode the bike and she rode along in this makeshift wagon. You really can't make this stuff up folks!

I will tell you that in the past I had complained that American TV only focused on US athletes and only showed events that we did well in; however, I have to tell you that China was the same way. They didn't even show the final day of track and field (I have to assume that it was because there were no Chinese involved) yet 3 channels were broadcasting the bronze medal women's basketball game featuring China.
Sev and I were lucky enough to get tickets to both the women's semifinal soccer match (Brazil vs. Germany) and the men's bronze medal match (Brazil vs. Belgium). Even though the games we saw took place in Shanghai, it was still very cool to be at the Olympics. The security was crazy (armed guards everywhere, metal detectors, x-ray machines, etc). I had to laugh when I heard that before the Olympics, people were concerned about terrorism here in China. Give me a break- this is one country that no one is stupid enough to mess with and terrorism is the last thing we worry about here (you are a thousand times more likely to get accidentally spit on than attacked by someone).

A shot of me with BeiBei (one of the mascots)- cheesy but I couldn't resist!