Beijing Olympics 2008

The third-generation (3G) mobile phone service is ready for use in the upcoming Beijing Olympics as the high-speed wireless connection service and related products were formally delivered on Monday.
China Mobile, China’s top wireless operator, and South Korean cell phone producer Samsung presented 15,000 3G handsets, plus data cards and nearly 3 million yuan (about US$428,600 ) of calling fees, to the Beijing Organizing Committee for the 29th Olympic Games here on Monday.
With the offer, work staff and volunteers of the Games can enjoy high-speed data transmissions, which allow them to watch televised games, play videos, and surf the Internet on cell phones.
The service is based on the Chinese 3G standard, known as TD-SCDMA (Time Division Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access).
China Mobile has basically finished construction of the TD-SCDMA network in eight cities, five of which are to host events for the Beijing Olympics in August, including Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin, said the company.
China has promised to provide 3G service for the Games. China Mobile is the sole cooperative partner for the Beijing Olympics in mobile communications services while Samsung is the only one in mobile terminal supply.
China Mobile started the commercial trials of 3G services in the country in April.
The International Telecommunication Union recognized TD-SCDMA as one of the world’s three official 3G standards in 2000. The other two are Europe’s WCDMA and North America’s CDMA 2000.

from: chinadaily.com.cn

With 100 days to go from Wednesday before the curtain rises on the 2008 Olympic Games, the organizers are busy fine-tuning for perfect staging of the world’s sporting spectacle.
Construction of venues, easing the city’s traffic congestion and efforts to clean up the air are all on target for the August 8-24 event, and International Olympic Committee officials have repeatedly voiced confidence that the athletes were going to experience a top class Games here this summer.
“There is every reason to believe that we will see here a gold-medal performance in August, also superb organization of the Olympic Games,” Hein Verbruggen, chairman of the IOC’s coordination commission for the Beijing Games, told reporters this month after his last inspection visit to the Chinese capital.
IOC president Jacques Rogge also predicted the Beijing Games to be a “great success”.
“Here and there are small details to be fine-tuned but I am saying that the level of preparedness … is really excellent and … I am optimistic that the Games will be a great success,” said Rogge.
The smooth construction of Olympic venues is a major source of confidence.
The National Stadium, known as the Bird’s Nest for its giant latticework structure of metal girders, opened and hosted its first official event on April 18 - a race-walking meet, putting an end to the city’s massive construction campaign that kicked off in December 2003.
Organizers said that the final touches on the 91,000-seat National Stadium won’t be complete until next month due to the extra work needed to prepare it for the August 8 opening ceremony. The iconic Olympic venue will also stage the closing ceremony and the athletics competitions.
The nearby National Aquatics Center, known as the Water Cube, was completed in January and hosted its first test event in February - the China Open swimming competition. The box-like venue with three pools below ground level is made up of a steel skeleton sheathed in a Teflon-like plastic membrance that mimics bubbling water.
Fears about risks of competing outdoors in Beijing are dwindling amid the continual improvement of the air quality. According to the Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau, the city notched up 67 “blue sky days” from January to the end of March, 12 more than the same period a year earlier and the highest in nine years.
Since being awarded the 2008 Games seven years ago, Beijing has engaged in an aggressive effort to clean up its toxic haze. The city has spent nearly more than 15 billion U.S. dollars on anti-pollution measures such as moving factories, adding subway lines, upgrading boilers and converting coal-heated homes to electric.
The authorities plan to close factories and force 19 heavy polluters to reduce emissions by 30 percent for the two months around the Olympics and Paralympics, and measures to limit factory emission are also in place for areas surrounding the capital, including the city of Tianjin, the provinces of Hebei, Shanxi and Shandong, and the Inner Mongolia region.
Based on a study released last month by IOC’s medical commission, Rogge said that the health of the athletes is “absolutely not in any danger” during Games time.
Officials are also confident about bringing traffic congestion under control with a ban on some cars during the Olympics and a plan to set up special lanes on key roads that link competition sites with the athletes’ village, the media village and training venues.
“Private vehicles, excluding taxis, will be ordered to stay off roads every other day in accordance with the even and odd numbers on the licence plates,” Beijing’s vice mayor Ji Lin said last month.
“The government is working on a compensation scheme for car owners and we will announce it later,” he added.
Highlighting the public’s enthusiasm for the greatest show on Earth, more than one million people were in the hunt for an Olympics volunteer’s post and training programs are well under way.
Third phase of the domestic ticket sales will start on May 5, with large crowds expected to chase the remaining 1.38 million tickets for 16 sports including volleyball, athletics, boxing and football.
Zhu Yan, director of the Olympic ticketing center, promised that there will be no repeat of the meltdown of the booking system that marred the previous round of sales.
“We have confidence in the system because our ticketing sponsor has increased the system’s capacity by folds,” he said. “Nonetheless, I hope that the public won’t be hasty to buy tickets.”
Demand is excessive outside the Chinese mainland, too. “The main pressure at the moment is that many National Olympic Committees continue to ask for more tickets,” said Zhu. “We are trying to dig out resources for tickets to satisfy the demand worldwide.”
Of the 6.8 million Olympic tickets available for sale, about 75 percent are reserved for the domestic public, with the rest going overseas.
The organizers are closer to selecting an official theme song with 30 candidate songs expected to be released at a gala show later on Wednesday.
“The final choice (of the theme song) is up to the BOCOG executive board,” said Zhao Dongming, head of the BOCOG’s cultural activities department.
Last, but not least, various campaigns aimed at improving the behavior of local citizens finally bore fruits. More and more people are getting to abandon old habits like spitting in public, jumping ahead in line and littering.
A survey released by Renmin University of China in February found that in 2007, 2.54 percent of people still spat, roughly a half of the figure for 2006, and the occurrence of littering in public dropped from 5.3 percent in 2006 to 2.86 percent in 2007 and queue-jumping from 6 percent to 1.5 percent.

from: chinadaily.com.cn

One World, One Dream is the theme of the Beijing Games - and if overseas ticket demand is any indicator, the whole world wants to be in Beijing for the Games to live their dream.
Beijing Games organizers have said that they are “still trying to dig out resources for tickets so as to satisfy demand worldwide”.
“Olympic tickets are ‘hot’ and the enthusiasm is very high,” said Zhu Yan, director of Beijing Olympic Ticketing Center.
“Overseas demand was taken fully into consideration in ticket sales, and we are still trying to provide more,” he added.
About 6.8 million tickets are available for sale for the Beijing Games and it is estimated that 75 percent of those will be for the domestic market.
Overseas tickets are handed over to the national or regional Olympic committees (NOCs) and most of them appoint ticket agents to deal with sales.
In Finland, for example, all the 10,000 tickets allocated have been sold out. Officials there are asking for more.
“The number of tickets we allocated for the NOCs is much more than that in previous Games,” said Zhu. “The allocation strictly followed the rules of the International Olympic Committee and we have tried our best to meet the needs of all the NOCs.
“But since their demand is still on the rise, we will continue to discuss with them and balance the requirements of all sides.”
Zhu said it is hard to put a figure on the exact number of tickets sold outside the Chinese mainland because sales are still under way.
On the Chinese mainland, the third and the final round of ticket sales start next month. About 1.38 million tickets will be on offer from May 5 to June 9.
Tickets for 244 events in 16 disciplines are available at Bank of China outlets or on the official ticketing website on a “first come, first served” basis.
People are allowed to buy a maximum of six tickets at one time, three each for two sessions.
Overwhelming demand caused the computer system to crash just a few hours after the second sales phase started six months ago, forcing organizers to revert to a lottery system.
But Zhu reassured people that thousands of tickets are available for most of the events, and urged them not to rush. The system has been fixed and there will be no repeat of the chaos in the previous round, he said.
“The system has been optimized and updated and it is being tested right now,” Zhu said last week. “I am confident that the system will meet the requirements of customers.”
People who paid for the tickets through the website can get their tickets printed anytime during the third phase and those who paid at Bank of China outlets can get tickets on site.
The first stage of the domestic sales was conducted from April to June last year, with some 1.6 million tickets, including all the tickets for the opening and closing ceremonies, allocated by lottery.
The second stage was launched last October but was suspended until December. About 1.8 million tickets were sold.
Ticket delivery for the buyers in the first two stages is planned to start in June.

from: xinhuanet.com

A ticketing staff displays sample tickets for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing April 23, 2008. The tickets, with the “lucky cloud” and the Bird’s Nest designs will go on sale for the third round starting from May 5.
A total of 1.38 million tickets will be put on sale for 16 sports, including athletics, boxing, basketball, and soccer. Each individual buyer is allowed to purchase no more than six tickets - three tickets each for two sports sessions.
Chinese residents also have the possibility of buying six more tickets.
“If you order six tickets on the first day of this (third) round, you can buy more tickets several days later as long as you have paid the former six tickets,” explained Zhu Yan, the ticketing director of BOCOG.
Ticket will be sold on a “first come, first served” basis at Bank of China outlets and on the official ticketing website.
“There are roughly 100 days to go before the Games open. We don’t have enough time for a lottery draw,” said Zhu.
He promised the meltdown of the booking system, which disrupted the earlier round of ticket sales would not happen again.
“I have confidence in the system because the ticketing sponsors have made a lot of improvements,” he said.
The design for the tickets was also unveiled on Wednesday. It has drawn on the National Stadium, known as the Bird’s Nest, and the lucky cloud as the main visual elements, said Zhu.
“We have adopted a series of anti-counterfeiting technologies in the process of designing the tickets. It is almost impossible to create fake tickets,” he said.

from:

The upcoming Olympic torch relay in the Japanese city of Nagano will further expand the traditional friendship between the Chinese and Japanese people, Chinese Ambassador Cui Tiankai said on Tuesday.

In an interview with Xinhua and other Chinese media, Cui said the torch relay would provide a fresh opportunity to further enhance the amicable sentiment between the two peoples.

Describing Japan as one of the most important neighbors of China and a country sharing long-lasting, extensive and profound cultural and historical links with China, Cui said the torch relay is to exhibit Chinese people’s expectation and passion for the Olympic Games.

People in Nagano and throughout Japan are standing with the Olympic spirits as Japan is the first Asian country to host the Olympic Games and Nagano was the host of the 1998 Winter Olympics, Cui said, adding that local Japanese people’s ardor and fervor for the torch has been witnessed.

“As the Olympic torch embodies the Olympic spirits and is a symbol of peace, friendship and progress, we will be pleased to see the union of people around the globe under the light of the flame, transcending differences between states, races and ideologies, for gorgeous pictures and harmonious melodies of the earth,” Cui added.

Concerning the preparation for the torch relay, Cui spoke highly of the tangible and fruitful efforts made by the Japanese Olympic Committee and the Nagano municipal government.

The ambassador especially thanked Japanese high-level government officials, including Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda, for their repeated pledges for safety and support for the torch relay, as well as the Japanese parliament for establishing a union, headed by Lower House Speaker Yohei Kono, to provide material and spiritual support for the event.

A lot of Japanese celebrities from all circles, including athletes, singers and comedians, have actively applied to be torch bearers, Cui said, adding that the Chinese people were inspired by their enthusiasm.

The ambassador also expressed his extraordinary honor and proud of being one of the three Chinese torch bearers in the Japanese stop.

“I fully understand the significance of the torch and will take every step wholeheartedly. I am to properly fulfill my mission and contribute to the success of the entire torch relay,” Cui said.

chinadaily.com.cn

French President Nicholas Sarkozy on Monday invited disabled Chinese torchbearer Jin Jing - who has become a national celebrity for defending the Olympic torch from Tibet secessionists during the Paris leg of its relay - to visit France again “to make up for the pain you have suffered”.
Sarkozy’s invitation was delivered in a letter presented to Jin by French Senate President Christian Poncelet soon after he arrived in Shanghai for a week-long visit to China.
“I would like to express to you my shock at the way you were attacked in Paris on April 7 when you were holding the Olympic flame. You showed outstanding courage, which honors you, and your country,” Sarkozy was quoted as saying in the letter.
“To make up for the pain you have suffered, I sincerely invite you to France in the near future as my friend and a friend of the French people.”
Jin has been dubbed the “Smiling Angel in a Wheelchair” after protecting the torch while a Tibetan separatist tried to wrest it from her during the relay in the French capital.
Sarkozy said he once again expresses “strong condemnation of such despicable action”.
“What happened in Paris has engendered a feeling of bitterness in your country. I want to assure you that the incidents that were brought about by a few people on that sad day don’t reflect the feelings of my fellow countrymen for the Chinese people,” the letter says.
The message came at a time when anti-France sentiment is running high among the Chinese after the torch’s travails in Paris.
Some have called for a boycott of retail giant Carrefour in response to media reports that it supports the Dalai group.
In an interview published in Journal du Dimanche, Carrefour Chief Executive Jose Luis Duran denied the allegation and said his company was “taking the situation very seriously”.
Sarkozy’s letter to Jin suggests France is returning to rationality, Chinese analysts said.
“Sarkozy needs to weigh the stability of the strategic partnership between the two countries,” said Professor Zhao Junjie at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, adding Chinese people’s resentment appeared to have found resonance with the French leader.
He also called on the Chinese to be rational when expressing anger toward France.
“They should bear in mind that jeopardizing relations with France is not in our national interest,” Zhao said.
More French officials will seek to soothe Chinese sentiment soon.
Former prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin will arrive tomorrow to meet Premier Wen Jiabao, and Sarkozy’s diplomatic adviser Jean-David Levitte will come to China at the end of the week.

from: chinadaily.com.cn

From the Panathenaikon Stadium in Athens, where the first modern Olympic Games were held 112 years ago, the Olympic flame is being passed onto the National Stadium - the main venue for this summer’s Beijing Games.
For Chinese architect Li Xinggang it symbolizes not only the relay of the Olympic spirit, but also the inheritance of classical architecture.
“From an architect’s viewpoint, Panathenaikon Stadium reflects the basic elements of a stadium - the stands and a field, while the design of the National Stadium was also inspired from the relation between the stands and the field,” said Li.

The 39-year-old Li was one of the chief architects of the National Stadium, known as the Bird’s Nest for its giant latticework structure of metal girders resembles a nest.
In November 2002, the China Architecture Design and Research Group and Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron launched a joint bid for the design of the National Stadium.
Four months later, the scheme produced by Li and his colleagues was chosen as the winner.
“The assessment by the judging panel, together with the voting results by the public, justified our initial thoughts,” said Li. ” When I received the official document that confirmed our victory, I had only one feeling — our design deserves it.”
Despite the stadium’s unusual design, their architectural concept was very simple, Li said.
“We were inspired by the shape of a bowl with lower tiers and higher tiers,” he said. “It embodies the essence of a sports stadium.”
The icon of the Beijing Olympics is hosting its first official event on Friday and Saturday — a low-key race-walking meet, but the final touches on the 91,000-seat stadium won’t be completed until next month.
“I have spent six years on this project and have regarded it as my child. Witnessing it grows up, it’s really an unforgettable experience for me,” said Li.
“Many people are marveled by its outward appearance, but you can only feel its real charm when you go inside.
“I believe all the spectators and athletes will appreciate it very much when the competitions start.”
In addition to the opening ceremony, the stadium will host track and field events and the closing ceremony.

from: chinadaily.com.cn

Athletes competing in a marathon on Sunday showed less concerns for air pollution during the incoming Beijing Olympics rather than possible heat waves and humidity.
The 42.195-kilometer race was held as a test event for marathoners to run on a newly designed Olympic course which meets historical cites and major business streets including China’s top two universities and is different from that adopted in annual Beijing marathon event.

The temperature dropped to about 15 Celsius degrees after the start, much cooler than the last two days when a race walking challenge was held at nearly 28 degrees. It turned heavy raining one and a half hours later, breaking up mass martial art performance in the finish, the National Stadium, or “Bird’s Nest”.

“Although it is freezingly raining today, I would make more preparation for heat and humidity in August,” silver medalist Zhou Chunxiu, expected as another Olympic hope for China’s track and field besides hurdler Liu Xiang, said in all wet body covered by towel after race.

No information from the marathoners was available during the race because the organizers temporarily canceled live TV broadcast on Sunday morning, giving a reason that there was no remote pickup unit in a short notice.

Being repeatedly asked by foreign journalists for a comment on Beijing’s air pollution, many athletes stood shivering when passing the mixed zone, leaving only “it is cold.”

“The pollution yesterday was bad, but today it rains and does not really bother the competition,” said Mara Rosalind Yamauchi who finished fifth.

“Air pollution will be a challenge for the Olympics and I hope the organizers could improve it,” she said.

The British, who married a Japanese, said she will come to Beijing this summer and try her best in marathon, but also confirmed that she will do her training in Japan, Macao and Switzerland before August.

“The overall preparation is good, it is just a test event,” Yamauchi said the course is “smooth” and the stadium is “fantastic”, despite some details to be improved.

Mongolia’s Serod Batochir, gold medalist in men’s race, said he had not felt any pollution because of the rain, adding that hot and wet weather in August will be a more headachy problem for him.

Toilet was another issue in the marathon race started from Tiananmen Square at the heart of the capital as a symbolic venue to hold prominent ceremonies in China.

The British marathoner told she has not found any toilets at the start to some foreign journalists.

However, some Chinese journalists and volunteers who had not been to the marathon start insisted that there must be some toilets since Beijing has held many marathons.

“It is also possible that the British athlete did not ask the volunteers at the start or they failed to told her toilet’s location,” one of the volunteers working at a press conference room for the race, “it is unfair to say there is no toilet only for one athlete claimed she didn’t find one.”

from: chinadaily.com.cn

KUALA LUMPUR - The sacred flame of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games on early Sunday arrived in the Malaysia capital of Kuala Lumpur, the 13th leg of its global torch relay.
A chartered plane carrying the flame, which was ignited on March 24 in ancient Olympia of Greece, landed on the Kuala Lumpur international airport at local time 02:30 a.m. local time (1830GMT) from Bangkok, capital of Thailand.
Jiang Xiaoyu, vice president of the Beijing Organizing Committee of Olympic Games (BOCOG), carried the lantern of the flame and walked off the plane.

Upon arrival at the airport, Jiang and the flame received a warm welcome by a cheering crowd, among whom are Deputy president of the Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) M. Jegathesan and OCM honorary secretary Sieh Kok Chi.
Chinese ambassador to Malaysia Cheng Yonghua also came to the airport to welcome the flame of the Beijing Olympics, which is scheduled to be held this August.
The Kuala Lumpur leg of the torch relay, which will be started from Dataran Merdeka and concluded at the famous “Twins Tower” KLCC, will start on Monday afternoon. Eighty torch bearers will take part in the relay.
The Olympic global torch relay will cover 137,000 kilometers before the flame returns to Beijing.

from: chinadaily.com.cn

Hundreds of Chinese students in Japan signed their names on three flags on Saturday to extend their support for the Beijing Olympic Games.
The campaign, initiated by the Chinese Students in Japan Friendship Association, plans to collect over 10,000 signatures of Chinese students and scholars in Japan.
At the opening ceremony of the campaign held in the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, the Chinese students set up banners promoting Olympic spirits and the Beijing Olympics slogans such as “One World, One Dream.”
“Through the campaign, we want to spread the Olympic spirits and the notion of peace, and to call on the people who support the Beijing Olympics to join together,” said Zhang Bi, secretary general of the Chinese Students Association in Japan.
“We also want to tell Japanese students that the Olympic Games is not only for China, but the whole world and the entire humankind,” Zhang told Xinhua.
During the Olympic torch relay in Japan’s Nagano city on April 26, the three flags, with the color of red, yellow and blue respectively, will be extended to spectators for their signatures.
The flags will then be presented to the Organizing Committee of the Beijing Olympic Games, said Li Guangzhe, chairman of the association.

from: chinadaily.com.cn