Olympic Wrap-up

Hi everyone! I just wanted to write a final post to say, first and foremost, thanks for reading! Knowing how many of you were visiting this blog made it really exciting to write. Thanks for all your comments, emails, etc. I really appreciate it. At the height of the Olympics I was averaging 200 readers a day! I had a fantastic time and it was really fun sharing my experiences with all of you.

I'd been to China two other times and I think that because of that I thought this trip would not be as new an experience as it turned out to be. Urban China is changing so fast that even a visit every year means that I am still surprised by new developments. And the Olympics were so much bigger, more emotional, more exciting, more fun, and more impressive than I realized they would be. The super-friendly, ridiculously helpful, and genuinely caring army of Olympic Park volunteers alone made an impression on me that I could never have guessed. I don't know how many other trips in my life will be as compelling and impactful as this one.

Some other bits of business before I wrap this up.

I've posted a complete gallery of the photos Jenn and I took (some I posted on the blog, some I did not) - from the first day to the last - on smugmug. You can get to it by clicking here. Be sure to also check out Jeff Kao's guest posts on cycling (1 and 2) on this blog and his photos on flickr.

I've also just put up two other new posts besides this one.

1. I edited together snippets of video of the trip from the Great Wall back to the Kao's condo in Beijing... it shows the progression from rural to urban in about 4 minutes.

2. The Fuwa videos and pics were so popular that I've posted a final Fuwa entry below. If you're curious, the Fuwa dancing at synchronized diving, the crowded McDonalds, and entering the Bird's Nest were the three most popular videos.

I'll be keeping the blog up for the forseable future - so feel free to pass it along to other friends and families. My Aunt Amy even printed out each entry and mailed them to my non-computer using grandmother! Gotta love that!

Thanks for reading!

From the Great Wall to Beijing

The drive from the section of the Great Wall that we visited back to Beijing is about an hour. I took snippets of video during that drive as we moved from rural to urban and cut them together.

On the way to the wall we passed through some really rural towns but I didn't take video (stupid, stupid!) so this montage really only gives you a feel for somewhat rural to urban... At the very end you can see the mall with the video screen sky above it that I mentioned a while ago.

More Fuwa! (aka more Friendlies!)

The video of the Fuwa dancing at synchronized diving turned out to be the most popular video clip I posted. And, as I mentioned in some other posts, I was a big fan of the Beijing Olympic mascots. So here are more Fuwa pics and videos!

Pics and Video of Fuwa and Cheerleaders at Women's Gold Medal Soccer Game




Fuwa cheering on baseball


VIDEO: Fuwa and Cheerleaders at Men's Gold Medal Soccer Final:



Fuwa being carried to the middle of the Bird's Nest (it's too tiring for the performers to walk the whole way) during prep for the Closing Ceremony.


Fuwa (bottom left) during the Closing Ceremony pre-show.

Additional Photos/Video from the Closing Ceremonies

See my previous post for details on my experience at the Closing Ceremonies. Here I'm just posting some additional photos and two pieces of video (one of me and Jenn showing what came in the gift bag and one snippet from the ceremony itself).





Before the show:


What's in the bag?:


150,000 plastic torches:

Closing Ceremonies!

Our Olympic experience ended spectacularly. Our seats in the Bird's Nest were unbelievable and the show was beautiful, surprising, and very impressive. In person I thought the highlights were the early pre-athlete arrangement where they had people rolling in those glowing cirque-du-soleil type wheels through roads of glowing people and the part where all those acrobats scaled the "torch" tower and creating moving human flames, flowers, etc. Really among the best live performances I've ever seen.

I was a little underwhelmed by the London portion... even Beckham himself seemed to feel a little out of place. Before the ceremony began Jenn had said... what the heck is Beckham gonna do? He can't sing, he can't dance... is he just gonna kick a soccer ball. Ummm... yeah... he's just gonna stand up and kick a soccer ball. The crowd went crazy for him anyway... and when the bus got stuck just before it exited the stadium the fans there screamed like 14 year old girls (and I don't think many of them were 14). I thought that the transforming red double decker bus was a great idea... but both Jenn and I really wanted the Rolling Stones to pop up out of it... or Paul McCartney... but know, it was just some pop singer I didn't recognize and Jimmy Page (who I also didnt' recognize at the time). Now don't get me wrong, Led Zeppelin ain't no slouch... but Jimmy Page on guitar wasn't quite enough. I wanted Sir Paul or Mick. And London's dancers seemed very hip and cool... in 1985!

Our seating area was a true international mix. To our left, Canadians and Australians. To our right Mexicans and Japanese. Behind us, Chinese and Russians. And that was just our immediate vicinity.

One of the coolest things was the gift bag... they give you all these props to be used at various points in the ceremony to create certain effects. I'll post a video later today of the contents.

All in all it was as memorable a show as I had hoped. I've posted a few pics below - I will post more photos and video later today when I have time to upload. I will also post a final entry or two when I get back home - can't believe that our trip is almost over!

Downsizing

Our Olympic cabal is splitting up. Jeff went home earlier in the week and Katherine leaves in a few hours. We went out to dinner and went shopping on Wangfujing – a major shopping street. Here’s some video and pics (including candy shopping!). Compare the video of this Beijing modern shopping street with the night market in Xi'an.







Video of Wangfujing:

Final Sporting Events (and Vince Vaughn)

We saw our last Olympic events over the past few days… only the Closing Ceremony remains. I can’t believe our trip is almost over!

Taekwondo was pretty cool… especially when they shriek and kick at the same time (both men and women). It was pretty interesting to see that whenever a Taiwanese fighter was in the ring the Chinese crowd would cheer for him by saying “Chinese Team, Add Gas!” (in other words, they were referring to him as Chinese)… while the Taiwanese fans would cheer for him by saying his name and then Add Gas, (in other words, they wouldn’t refer to him as being on the Chinese team). Everyone uses Jiayou, they could agree on that. And believe me, the Chinese fans REALLY cheered for the Taiwanese fighters… there was never a China vs. Taiwan match-up so I didn’t get to see what would happen in that situation.



Here is some video of the crowd reacting to a sudden-death overtime victory by a Taiwanese fighter:



The next morning we went and saw one of the baseball semifinals, Korea vs. Japan. Korea had a remarkable 7-0 record in the round robin and advanced into the playoffs as the #1 seed. But the Japanese jumped out ahead in this game until the Koreans pulled of a thrilling comeback and won the game 5-2.


Two Korean fans were SO excited that I just had to take a video of them when their team won:


We also saw two gold medal soccer games. The women’s game was Brazil vs. USA… it was a rainy, somewhat awkward game in which it seemed like Brazil was the better team but the USA managed to win 1-0. The Brazilians were crushed, they could barely smile on the Silver Medal stand. The men’s gold medal game was fantastic! Nigeria and Argentina battled it out in a beautiful contest in front of a crowd of 90,000 at the Bird's Nest. Wonderful passing, attacking, and defense. In the end, Argentina prevailed 1-0.





One of the fun parts of the women's soccer final was the celebrities in attendance. Kobe Bryant was there but we could barely see him. Vince Vaughn, however, was sitting a row or two in front of us:



Okay – that’s the wrap-up. Our last Olympic happening is the Closing Ceremony which happens on Sunday here in Beijing.

One last note – sorry I haven’t kept up with posting additional photos on smugmug… I’ve just not been able to find the time. If you read Jeff’s recent guest post you saw that he’s posted many of his Olympic photos on flickr – they’re really great (as was his earlier post about Olympic cycling). When I get back to the U.S. I’ll post a complete China photo album on smugmug.