Shopping Excursion

We went shopping Sunday during the day to get some supplies and snacks for our office suite. The company has several drivers contracted for our use during the games, and we've got access to one of them during the lead-up days. He tends to get a little lost, but "means well" and this was no exception...we meandered a bit but hey--we got to see a few more sights than we would've if we took a direct path! Our destination: Carrefort...a French chain that's something like a Wal-Mart SuperCenter. Only this one was in a shopping mall, was multi-story (and you had to pay at one level before you could move onto another one), and the level on which we bought most of our stuff seemed to have a single register open (despite there being thousands of people shopping there). Weird stuff!

We asked the driver where we could find some western-style snacks and he drove us to a little mom-and-pop store adjacent to a Holiday Inn (Kick-back? We couldn't figure out if the store owners were related to him or not). But he was right--they had lots of American brand snacks. We filled a cart to bursting and headed for the checkout. I wouldn't be surprised if they just closed up and went home when we were done--it was probably their typical sales for an entire week.

Here are a couple of pics from our excursion. You can't see it very well because of the terrible smog, but the curved-top building had huge LED TV screens in the sides right under the 2nd round bump-out.

There'll be no American Standard here, thankyouverymuch!

Interesting item of note #1:
So I'd read before I came over that around the touristy spots, the Chinese were updating public restroom facilities to "westernize" them (i.e., a standard-height toilet rather than a squat-toilet, adding urinals to men's rooms, etc.). Here in the press center building, which is new, all the sinks, toilets, urinals, etc are American Standard brand. Beginning yesterday, we started noticing little neatly-cut pieces of duct tape begin popping up over top of their logo on those fixtures. Funny!

Beijing Main Press Center (MPC)

Our offices are in the MPC (Main Press Center). It's a new, large 3-story facility hosting both general press facilities and specialized office spaces for larger media organizations like ours. There are also shops, restaurants, a bank, pharmacy, clinic, post office and 2 hotels connected to it. I didn't have my camera handy to take a picture of the outside on the way in this morning, so the one here (with the suspiciously blue sky...Photoshop, perhaps?) is one I pulled off the web. The office space is our private suite in the MPC before we started working on setting it up this morning (setting up our network, TV's, phones and other equipment). We have a reception room and this large work room shown here (we have about 70 people coming). If it changes radically, I'll post an updated pic later.

Media Housing - It's "OK"

A few pics of the media housing. It's a set of mid- to high-rise buildings (20-30 stories) clustered around a central coutyard, with another string of buildings running off that central area. Only credentialed folks can get in, and you have to go through airport-type security (x-ray machines, put your credential on a scanning machine, etc.) to get in and out. The complex is surrounded by a fence with guards about every hundred feet or so.

Inside the complex are several restaurants that I mentioned earlier (we've counted 8 so far), two gyms, pool, a couple of general stores, self-service laundry in each building and a full-service laundry/dry cleaner. There's a big park across the street from the housing, but I haven't checked it out yet.

There are a tremendous number of paid and volunteer staff everywhere you turn...we accidentally stumbled across their cafeteria last night at dinnertime while looking for the restaurant and despite seeing a lot of them outside, there must've been over 200 folks in the cafeteria.

The haziness you can see in the pictures isn't poor quality...it's the way the air really looks. Check out the buildings in the distance in the outdoor shots...if you can see them, that is!

Arrived in Beijing

Arrived safe and sound in Beijing. Still working on internet and work network connectivity, but we're in the Media Center facility this morning and I had a couple of minutes to make a quick post. More detail to follow...I promise.

• Airport: Nice & new, but had to wait around 40 minutes for our checked baggage.
• Transportation: There were a boatload of Olympics volunteers at the airport, and once we found the correct exit door where the shuttles were located, we got to our housing fine.
• Housing: The media village is new buildings, but they're pretty spartan and basic. I'll post some pictures I took of our room as soon as I can get them together. The description as being like college dorm suites was dead-on.
• Food: We went hunting for dinner last night at the media village. There are several restaurants (creatively named "Restaurant 1", "Restaurant 2", etc.). Only one was open. When we asked someone to direct us, he took us to the staff cafeteria...oops. We found the right one quickly, though, and were the only ones there. Food was OK. After that we just went back to our rooms, had a beer and were in bed by 8:30pm because we were all jet-lagged (I was up by 4am watching TV because I couldn't sleep that long).
• Climate: OMG...it's so smoggy here. I took a couple of pics (again, I'll get them up as soon as I can). I honestly feel sorry for the atheletes competing in outside endurance events.
• Logistics: Bear with me. We're still getting internet/network and telephone dial-out type stuff set up (actually, a lot of it is us setting it up for ourselves), so I'm getting access to things as quickly as I can for calling, emailing and updating the blog.

Gotta go...everyone's wanting to get breakfast before we get started this morning so they're leaving with or without me!

Gotta Love the Airlines!

I'm scheduled to leave in the morning so I went on United's website tonight to set up flight paging notification and my flight from Chicago to Washington DC (to meet up with the rest of the team for the flight to Beijing) has been cancelled. Woo hoo! Managed to get myself rebooked on an earlier flight leaving at 6am instead of the originally-planned 8am so the only "cost" to me is a couple hours of lost sleep. Asked the travel agent if she'd absolutely verified that I was still on the Washington to Beijing flight and she promised she had. Wish me luck!

Closing Ceremonies

So I found out today that my name has been put down for a ticket for the Closing Ceremonies. That is, of course, if I don't have to work during them. Kind of neat, though. Hope I'll be able to go!

Some Interesting Advice

So I was in a meeting today of the company staff who are going to Beijing and a lot of interesting advice came up during the meeting:

• According to briefings the company has had with the State Department and FBI, there will be thousands of security personnel on hand during the Games. We've been strongly encouraged not to challenge authority. Apparently, the Chinese can hold someone for up to 48 hours without even notifying anyone.
• We were also told to expect to be watched and/or bugged. I've posted previously a link to an article advising visitors to expect their computer security to be compromised.
• We were told to have no expectation of privacy...authorities may search our persons, housing or belongings with or without our knowledge or presence.
• Health-wise, we were told not to use tap water at all...not even to brush our teeth. It was suggested that we pack both immodium and something like pepto bismol...it was pointed out that due to the way immodium acts (I'm trying to be polite here), it will only serve to keep food- or water-borne bugs inside the body longer. We were also told to pack insect repellent with DEET because insects carrying dengue fever were present even inside the city.
• Finally, we were told that yellow was the color of the Falun Gong and when men wore green clothing, it indicated they were subservient to a woman. Good things to know when packing!

Credentials In Hand (Finally)!

Woo hoo! My credentials came through, so no more Visa application woes. I'll just use this card along with my passport as my identification.

Got my information about housing and such today also. Sounds like the apartments we're staying in are brand new, built for the games, but nothing too fancy. I'll be sharing an apartment with two guys...one I know and the other one I don't know very well.

The guy who'll be coming into my office once a week to help cover for me came and spent the day in my office today so I could review things with him and introduce him to the staff. It'll be nice knowing the users I support will be in great hands.

I'm starting to get excited. I leave on July 24th, so it's coming up quick!

Visa Issue Resolved?

Sounds like Mr Shi in Beijing is coming through for me (whew). Got an email from him saying that my OIAC Card (Olympic Identity and Accreditation Card), which will serve as a Visa, has been sent...presumably to the US Olympic Committee. I believe they had shipped the ones they had to our company's Olympic coordinator but I'll be surprised if my card made that shipment. I'm sure I'll continue to obsess about it until I have it in my own hands, but thankfully it sounds like that issue is finally working itself out. You can't see it, but I'm doing a little happy dance right now!

Clear Skies (Not) Ahead

Maybe I should take an oxygen tank with me? Check this video...sounds like the smog problem isn't getting any better!

Human Rights Watch

Not related to what I'm going to be doing, but a colleague forwareded me a link to the Human Rights Watch's Beijing Olympics related site.

Another Visa Attempt and Fun with Language

So the 10 days have passed since I sent my materials to the Beijing Olympic Media Center to get the letter I need to apply for a visa and nothing, nada, zilch. Took it to the company's Olympics coordinator and she got back to me with yet another email contact to send it to, a Mister Shi. Oh joy...now I'm sending it to a single person. Hope he's not sick or on vacation! Another form to fill out for him (basically the same as all the rest...heck I attached all the other stuff I've previously sent in to his form as well) and according to the information I was provided, I'll get an email telling me when I'm supposed to go over to the Consulate and (get this) they're supposed to have something there telling them it's OK to take my Visa application. Am I wrong to be skeptical?

Also, the company has scheduled "one last" meeting to make sure everything's in order. Ummmm...other than a cultural training seminar that I participated in via streaming video, this will be my "first" meeting with the rest of the folks supporting our company there. Questions...I have questions! Going to see if I can get one of my colleagues to forward me anything he got before I came onboard.

Our Olympics intranet site has some nifty language pronunciation YouTube videos on it. Oh.My.God...I'm convinced that I'm never going to learn even the most basic words or phrases! I sure do hope lots of folks speak English. If you're curious, check them out here, here and here.

Big Red's Gonna Be Watching Us

Interesting article about anticipated electonic espionage expected to be performed by the Chinese.

Fun!

Latest Advance-Planning Drama

So since my last post, here's the latest on things:
***Brian T won't be coming at the end of the Olympics for a few days of sight-seeing as we'd hoped. It was going to be incredibly expensive to bring him over for such a short period of time, plus China's never been high on either of our lists of destinations so it didn't make sense to spend all that money when we could save it and put it toward a destination that we both really wanted to see. Sent a cookie gift box to the travel agent to say a combination "thanks" and "sorry" for having gotten her to spend time researching hotel, flight and sight-seeing guide arrangements for us.

***In light of the above, I was able to convince United to change my flight back to its original return date (and at no cost, woo hoo!). I even managed to get aisle seats on all the flights, but my return flight from Beijing to Washington Dulles looks to be the last row in front of the rear galley, and if memory serves me correctly, those seats might not recline (d'oh!).

***The hassle over getting my Visa continues. Since the Chicago Chinese Consulate turned me away with my intial application, (vaguely) suggesting I needed a letter from the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG), I was given two methods to request a letter/document: an email address with a list of things to include and an online form to complete. Try as I might, that online form will not process, so I've scanned and emailed everything to the email address of the Beijing 2008 International Media Centre. I'm told it takes up to 10 days to hear back, so hopefully something will come through there.

So it appears I need a visa from China since my Olympic credentials may not be ready in time. I downloaded the application and completed it. Had a spare passport photo at home from the visa application for Brazil 2 years ago so I used it instead of having another one taken. I got a letter from my company explaining the nature of my visit to act as "support" to my application and went to the Chinese consulate's visa application office.

Imagine an emergency room waiting room on steroids. There must've been 50 or 60 people there. Take a number and wait...and wait...and wait. Watched many people go up to the window when their number was called and go away not exactly happy with the result. Glad I had my ducks in a row!

Two hours later, and literally minutes before they were going to break for lunch, my number came up. I needn't have waited so long. The ice princess behind the window took one look at my application, pushed it back at me and said "you need a letter". I quickly pointed her to the letter from my employer and she pushed a paper at me with a highlighted portion that said for business visas, a letter from the employer in China was required. "But I'm working for my company at the Olympics," I told her...and here's my letter. "Read the paper" she said. "Yes, but that doesn't apply in this situation, does it," I asked...this is the Olympics. They're not a business that's going to write me a letter.

Apparently, that's what they want to see. So I contact my company's Olympics coordinator. She's been a total rock star so far in getting everything together. "They want what?" she asks. Yeah, kinda like that. Later in the day, she gives me the email address of someone with the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG). I emailed her and am waiting to hear back from her.