Speak: Add Oil!

Harmonious 3-Wheel Add Water!
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People have also been asking me if I would be seeing any Olympic events, and being the lazy guy that I am, I did not make any effort to procure any tickets. I thought, eh, the Olympics. I already went to one in Atlanta.

But last week I caught the Olympic fever! Was it all the free beer that I couldn't drink? I began to rue my laziness at ticket procurement. But then the good Mr. Touff sent me an email saying he had extra tickets to see beach volleyball and asked if I would be interested.

"You're gosh darn right!"

Get to the stadium at about 9:30pm.




No super long lines.
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Entered the stadium, which reminded me of the US Open tennis stadium in Flushing. Except this stadium had...cheerleader/dancers! Boo-yaaaahhh!!! (Do cheerleaders make China a Modern Country or what?!)

There was a DJ that played short clips of songs in between points. "I like to move it move it...I like to move it move it...I like to...MOVE IT!"



You may be asking, what is that inflatable thing with the cheerleaders?
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That, my friend, is one of the Fuwa. There are 5 of them. They are the Beijing Olympic mascots, as seen on one of the 149,235,382 Olympic billboards now plastered all over China.



Their names are: Beibei, Jingjing, Huanhuan, Yingying, and Nini. They are inspired by the five Olympic rings. When you strategically put their names together--and only say the first syllable--together the Fuwa names form like Voltron to say: "Beijing Huanying Ni!" Which means "Welcome to Beijing!" (How adorable).

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They didn't tell us the cheerleaders' names, but the cheerleaders did have cowboy hats.



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Below another Fuwa came out to hype up the crowd. I ain't gonna lie. The Fuwa got me amped son!! (Not as amped as Chief Illiniwek though).



There was also an MC that got the crowd chanting, "Beijing Jia You!!!" (pronounced "jaahhh yooooo"). I was like, why is everyone saying "jia you," as it means "add oil."

BEIJING...ADD OIL!!!! I just got the memo that it basically means, "Let's go!" Apparently this chant has been around for decades (since cars entered daily life?).
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Oh yeah, there was also beach volleyball. Below is a pic from the 1st (of 3) matches we saw. Here the men's team from Australia battled the men's team from Brazil. Brazil won.



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The second match featured the US women's team vs. Cuba. However it was not the US team that beckoned good ol' President "Boo shi" (that's the Mandarin pronunciation) to get his Akon on.





That was actually the first time I saw that video. What a storyline! Oh and the US won, although Cuba had this player named Crespo that was dooooooooooope.
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The last match was a showdown between Holland and Germany. Germany won.



As you can see there were quite a few empty seats, although it was getting pretty late by that point. I was curious about the crowd size, because I had also been hearing/reading reports that there lots of empty seats at most of the non-finals events.

One might have thought that since everyone here was so excited about the Olympics and patriotic fervor that all the events would be sold out. Since this is China's moment in the sun around the world, I was kind of hoping to see more local Chinese experiencing the Olympics.

At the beach volleyball stadium, though, much of the crowd seemed to be comprised of foreigners cheering on their own country and of course adorning themselves with flags.

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I have been curious about what the laobaixing (aka "common folk") in Beijing think about the Olympics, now that this glorious moment has finally arrived. Earlier I mentioned that nobody seemed to be complaining about the driving restrictions or some of the other sacrifices for the Olympics.

You'd see signs like the one below all over Beijing. (I find this signs to be so "Chinese" in that they lack any irony. Then again, most public service announcements are pretty un-ironic. But Chinese public service announcements are even more un-ironic. This reminds me of a comment I heard about irony not being as heavily trafficked in Chinese culture as in, let's say, Williamsburg. I think this difference has a pretty huge impact on the music scene...but more on this later).



"I participate, I contribute, and I enjoy"

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Anyway now that the Games have started, I have started to hear some grumbling, which I suppose should not be so surprising. Whereas before August nobody really knew exactly what to expect, now it's quite apparent that these Games are more for the powers-that-be, the huge multinational corporations, and the viewing enjoyment for the rest of the world.

"Acting like life is a big commercial."

On the other hand, it's hard to see the immediate benefits for the common folk. Prices are going up for basic necessities, and the Olympics aren't helping the peeps, just causing inconveniences. For example, my Chinese teacher said that the powers-that-be wanted to shut down her neighborhood fruits and vegetables market during the Olympics because of crowd issues. The people got salty and protested, and a compromise was reached stipulating the market could remain open for 2 hours a day (instead of 4).

I've heard vendors having to move locations or shut down operations altogether, because they don't fit with the Beijing Truman Show image and storyline. (see below).



This photo of the "Coca Cola Zone" was taken at The Place, right outside the venue which held the Puma and Jamaican embassy party.

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What is for the laobaixing? The common folk?

As far as viewing the Games, practically all of the local Chinese just watch the events on TV at home or in small groups in restaurants or shops. (I noticed almost every shop has a small TV!)





Not the same festive atmosphere as watching sporting events in large crowds, in my opinion.

I had heard that most of the local Chinese were not really making much of an effort to see events live. There is the perception that the lines are too long, it's too much of a headache, and the tickets would be too expensive.

Then I heard that people (foreigners) have been able go to non-finals events and get tickets at face-value (around 30 USD) with relative ease. No waiting in huge lines.

I wondered if the ticket procurement motivational disparity centered around the notion of watching sports itself. For many of the Chinese, because they are so personally invested in seeing their athletes win and represent China favorably against the rest of the world, maybe the joy of watching sport for the sake of sport is sometimes absent?

I was reading a sports article written by a guy, who was saying how much he was enjoying watching random countries compete and just seeing the athletes perform at such a high level. He had no emotional investment in any of the events, but was explaining how much fun he was having just watching all these random sports that he normally does not care about. And to him, that was what made the Olympics experience great.

I think it is this sentiment the drives many of the expats to try and find tickets now that the Games have started. (It also helps that many expats work for or know friends who work for Olympic sponsors who have huge batches of tickets that often go unused).

On the flip side, I think many Chinese feel like why should I waste my time waiting in line to try to pay for a ticket that's still a huge chunk of my salary and to see non-Chinese athletes who have no bearing on how China is seen by the world. Again it helps me to understand the Olympics in the context of the past 150 years in China (e.g., enduring things like England taking over Hong Kong because China unsuccessfully did not want England selling opium in China).

Maybe each Chinese gold medal is somehow a chip against those memories for the collective Chinese psyche.

One day maybe we can all follow the words of Speak. (Had to bring back this oldie, but oh-so goodie).