Flashes of Panic

However much I posted about the Olympics, I didn’t post much about China. There’s a perfectly good reason for that: I barely saw it.

I could blame this on the Chinese government and BOCOG, who really wanted me (and all the other foreigners in China for the Olympics) to stick around the Olympic Green and talk about, write about, and generally appreciate what Great Olympics they were putting on. I didn’t meet any bureaucratic resistance to tourism, but the Authorities had the power to make some things easy and other things complicated, and “staying close to the action” was made easy and “rambling around Beijing” was made hard.

I could also blame my work, which (quite correctly) required me to focus monomaniacally on the inside of the Bird’s Nest and the awesome things happening in there. Most days, my schedule involved being up at 7:15, showered, fed, and out of the hotel by 8:15, and on the job at the stadium by 8:30 or so. (Yes, it took anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes to cover the 200m straight-line distance from the hotel to the stadium, thanks to multiple security checks, limited entrances, etc.)

I’d have a window starting anywhere from noon to 2 PM until around 5, when I needed to be working my way back through security to the stadium to eat (I had access to an IAAF VIP lounge—note that access to the lounge did not make me a VIP—which was where I ate dinner most nights.) Subways downtown were free but required at least two train changes and took as much as an hour, between walking to the Olympic Green stop and the actual travel time, which doesn’t leave much exploring time. The Forbidden City, they say, can take a full day to “do” properly, even when your credential (again) gets you in free.

And then the evening session would have me working until midnight (earliest) or 2 AM (latest), giving me somewhat less than enough time to sleep before starting over, which meant I liked spending that window time sleeping.

Certainly these conditions made things difficult, but I can’t help feeling I could’ve applied myself more. I did make it up to the Great Wall on one of the days with no morning session, and down to the Forbidden City on the other, but in tourism terms that means I just managed to clear the opening height. If you asked me, I’d have to say I still haven’t really seen Beijing, let alone the rest of China.

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