Flashes of Panic

I don’t have any illusions about the level of scrutiny the Chinese government is likely to give my visit to Beijing (that is, very little). I’m unlikely to revisit the experience one of my colleagues had, in 1980, of returning to his hotel room to find the KGB searching his suitcase. (He was asked to sit and wait while they finished, if I recall correctly.)

That said, I am trying to figure out what level of care to apply to my laptop, since it seems possible that my hard drive could be scanned, and I’m definitely paying attention to the books I bring. I’ve had some real liberal-thought bombshells suggested to me, but the two paperbacks I know will be in my bag are slightly more subtle; they both deal with the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

The parallels between the two Games held by recently-reclusive powers using the Olympics as a coming-out party are not hard to see. (Though apparently the Germans made it more of a party than the Chinese are ready for.) Certainly there are plenty of differences between Germany 1936 and China 2008. But there are plenty of similarities. I’ve picked up Louis Zamperini’s biography (I mentioned him a few days ago) and in Portland the other week, in Powell’s, I picked up a copy of Jeremy Schaap’s book about Jesse Owens, Triumph.

They make a decent case against boycotts, standing together, but they also don’t paint the hosts in a rosy historic light. I’d love to see the PRC make their case for taking them away from me; they’re not directly critical or dangerous to them in any way, only in their oblique implications.

Any similar titles I should be picking up? Note that paperbacks are heavily favored for long plane rides.