One of my favorite writers reveals just how shallow Brooks’ “analysis” of China is. Go there now.

I was on the Olympic Green all day today and was amazed at what I saw, or rather at what I didn’t see, namely crowds of people. There were none. The Green was a relative ghost town (compared to past Games). It took no time at all to get there, and only seconds to get through security. Nearly all the faces were Chinese; Westerners were in very short supply, for whatever reasons.

The low numbers is due in large part to a new and especially neurotic BOCOG policy forbidding anyone but ticket holders and staff from entering the Green. (Usually visitors can get a day pass and stroll around at their leisure.) So the place is kind of depressing. Watching some of the Games isn’t too uplifting either, seeing all those empty seats. Well, they did bring it on themselves, but I also feel sorry to see it.

Sorry, but that’s all I’ve got time for blogging today.

Go here and keep scrolling. UPDATE: this one is definitely worth a look as well.

I’ve only been able to watch bits and pieces. It’s way cheesier than I had hoped.

UPDATE: I have to say, I was wrong when I called it cheesy. I was only able to watch about 2 hours of the Opening Ceremony and I learned yesterday that by chance I caught the very worst part – the interminable walking around the track by athletes waving flags -and some children dancing. Since then I saw some extended clips of what I missed, and I spoke with many people who were actually there. The clips I saw were amazing. Absolutely beautiful. And everyone I know who was there said it was truly beyond belief despite the oppressive heat. They loved it. (They all agreed about the flag-waving athletes.)

So I retract my earlier comment. I should have said some sections were cheesier than I expected.

This has been making the rounds these past few weeks, but with the day finally here, it’s too hysterical not to post.

“We can be sure it is a trap. They’ve been preparing for this for thousands of years. According to the satellite images we are getting from Beijing, they are digging large holes which they claim are for Olympic venues, but we know full well they are going to cover them up with branches and leaves and the athletes from America are going to fall right into them.  Nah, they’re going to wait until it gets dark and then they are going to bring out their dragons…”

Perhaps the funniest/saddest part is the comments section on You Tube where not a few idiot fenqing completely missing the satirical quality of the video–not that irony and satire are common currency in the fenqing mindset–and go right into robotic whining mode about how some vaguely defined “West” hates China.

Enjoy.

Careful what you say. The cabs have ears.

Tens of thousands of taxi drivers in Beijing have a tool that could become part of China’s all-out security campaign for the Olympic Games. Their vehicles have microphones installed ostensibly for driver safety that can be used to listen to passengers remotely.

The tiny listening devices, which are connected to a global positioning system able to track a cab’s location by satellite, have been installed in almost all of the city’s 70,000 taxis over the past three years, taxi drivers and industry officials say.

As with digital cameras used in cities such as London, Sydney or New York, the stated purpose of the microphones is to protect the driver. But whereas the devices in other countries can only record images, those devices in Beijing taxis can be remotely activated without the driver’s knowledge to eavesdrop on passengers, according to drivers and Yaxon Networks Co., a Chinese company that makes some of the systems used in Beijing. The machines can even remotely shut off engines.

And people I know hold confidential meetings in taxis on their mobile phones all the time. I mean, like every day. Maybe ask the driver to increase the volume on that cantopop he’s listening to?

Via this excellent blog.

As everybody knows, it was always a matter of ‘when’ not ‘if’ stunt protesters would descend on the Beijing Olympics.  Sure enough, today somebody climbed a 100-foot electrical pole near the Olympic Green to fly a “One World, One Dream, Free Tibet” flag for the length of time it took the Beijing Fire Department and PSB to arrive and take it down.  The protesters were all–unsurprisingly–foreigners.

But back to the if/when thing…I’ve maintained all along that China risks losing face in the international court of public opinion not because such stunts will happen (they will, nothing can change that) but what the reaction will be by official representatives on the ground, especially toward any media outlets interested enough to cover such protests.  The answer so far: Not well.

ESPN Blogger Arty Berko is in Beijing covering the games as a credentialed journalist.  Following word of an ‘incident’ at the Green, he rode his bike over to check it out.  Berko reports:

There was a crowd of about 100 people down the hill from where the post was located; policemen were located at the top of the hill, closer to the post.

I dropped my bike and started taking pictures. After a few minutes, I wanted to try to talk to the man up on the post. So, I climbed up the hill to get a closer look. I yelled out, “Hey buddy, who are you?” The policemen turned and looked at me, but didn’t react. But then, a man in civilian clothes (he was wearing shorts and a T-shirt) started screaming at me and tried to wave me away.

I held up my credential and yelled out, “TV! Media! Press!”

The man kept yelling, speaking mostly in Mandarin; but through some broken English, he pointed to the stadium, saying, “You’re only here for [this].” He was implying that I was only here to cover the Games and this protest was none of my business. Then, he screamed, “Who are you? Who are you?” I kept trying to explain I was credentialed media.

Some of the policemen walked toward me and grabbed me by the arm. They were angry and aggressive while holding on to me, yelling in my face. But I still kept yelling, “TV! Media! Press! TV! Media! Press!” The policemen were speaking into their walkie-talkies, but I didn’t understand what they were saying.

I then went back to the bottom of the hill and took more pictures. By that point, a fire truck pulled up and moved a cherry picker up the pole to try to bring down the protester. The same civilian came down the hill and started screaming at me again. Some of the onlookers joined in, and I was circled by people who started pushing and shoving me, screaming and pointing to the stadium. I never got hit or punched, but I was definitely physically accosted. I was trying to be smart about it and I wasn’t hitting anyone, but I kept yelling, “Media! Press!”

Am I the only one who thinks that before the Games are all over there is going to be at least one ugly incident involving a foreign journalist, the police and/or hopped-up Chinese spectators? 

For what it’s worth, I think the kinds of stunt protests the four activists pulled this morning are more self-aggrandizing than anything else.  If people were serious about reaching out and trying to effect change, they might start by writing the signs in Chinese. (UPDATE: Several are reporting that there were also Chinese signs as well.)

That said, if the ensuing confrontation was any indication of how the local boyos and the PSB react to protests/media spectacles during the games, then we’re in for a rocky few weeks.

…who doesn’t think the mood in the city is now totally, breathtakingly surreal – a hundred times more so than usual? It’s really here, that moment so many have been waiting for, whether with trepidation or joy, and it’s starting to sink in: This is it. Police cars, sirens whirring, are everywhere, taxis are at a premium, everyone seems to be trying to speak English, and there’s a general mood of contained hysteria. It’s the moment of truth. They asked for it, they got it. Let the cards fall where they may.

This is one of the oddest, most disturbing stories I’ve read about Internet depravity. Parts of it are simply unbelievable.

“Lulz” is how trolls keep score. A corruption of “LOL” or “laugh out loud,” “lulz” means the joy of disrupting another’s emotional equilibrium. “Lulz is watching someone lose their mind at their computer 2,000 miles away while you chat with friends and laugh,” said one ex-troll….

Another troll explained the lulz as a quasi-thermodynamic exchange between the sensitive and the cruel: “You look for someone who is full of it, a real blowhard. Then you exploit their insecurities to get an insane amount of drama, laughs and lulz. Rules would be simple: 1. Do whatever it takes to get lulz. 2. Make sure the lulz is widely distributed. This will allow for more lulz to be made. 3. The game is never over until all the lulz have been had.”

…The willingness of trolling “victims” to be hurt by words, he argued, makes them complicit, and trolling will end as soon as we all get over it.

Their oxygen is your reaction. Without it, they’re rendered impotent. Enough said.

While you’re over at the NYT, be sure to read this shocker, which I’m sure gave Michelle Malkin a dizzy high. And when I say a shocker….

It’s hardly an exhaustive list and is mostly based on observations and experiences from the past week or so, but I thought I’d jot down a few of my favorite things about the ‘Jing.

• Beijing parks in the early morning.  Jingshan, Beihai, even tiny Nanguan…parks all over the city are bustling at 6:00 a.m. I’m certainly not a gerontologist, but there has to be a significant mental and physical benefit to seniors who participate in daily group exercise.  And the variety of activities is something to behold–dancing, tai chi, calligraphy, bird walking, one fellow who bends at the waist, legs straight, and walks on all fours for the length of the park (try this sometime, you won’t make it 10 yards).

• The variety of great food available for less than 10 RMB.  Snacks, breakfast, lunch, noodles, chuan’r…you can live in Beijing and spend anywhere between 15 and 1500 kuai on dinner, and some of my 15 kuai dinners have been the better than a few fancy banquets I’ve attended by a long shot.

• I like the new metro lines. The trains are comfortable and the two giant xiangqi boards built into the floor of the Dongsi Line 5 platform are a nice touch.

• Hutong living.  YJ and I just moved into a small pingfang in a yard with about 19 other families.  The yard itself is cool and I love our little house, but the best part about living there are the neighbors.  Within a week of moving in, we’ve met just about everybody and it really seems like the residents all look out for each other.  (By contrast, we lived in our loufang for nearly two years and never exchanged more than a forced ‘ni hao’ with the yuppie across the hall.)  It’s also been fun sitting in the middle courtyard with the neighbors after dinner shooting the shit about whatever.  Good times.

• Basketball.  You’re never far away from a court in Beijing and once you’re on the court, it’s easy to get into a game.  The skill level varies wildly among the local players, but the enthusiasm is always consistently high.  Generally speaking too, people are pretty good sports.  There will always be exceptions, but it’s usually a friendly atmosphere without a lot of egos getting in the way of a good game.

• So many people are into history.  I love it when random interactions with strangers or passing acquaintances turn into 45 minute discussions of military strategy during the Ming-Qing transition.

• Good move on the part of the municipality to go to odd/even days for cars.  It hasn’t really had any effect on the air quality, but it’s made the streets a lot nicer for bikes and pedestrians.  Personally, I wouldn’t have any objection to making the policy permanent after the games.

• Ding zuo. You can have just about anything custom made in Beijing. Dining room table in the showroom too short? We’ll build it taller.  Need to hide the ugly refrigerator in the middle of your living room? Custom-made Qing style cabinet with no floor or back and an extra-wide door.  Good suits. Leather shoes. Whatever.  If you can draw a picture and give some idea of what size and color, somebody can make it for you.

• The music scene. They’ll never get on the radio, but bands like Joyside, Snapline, Buyi, Brain Failure, and Second Hand Rose (to name only a very very few) play good music with passion.  Sure a lot of the bands might not have the greatest chops and some of the songwriting lacks polish, but the level of enthusiasm with which the music is performed makes up for a lot.  Besides, when was rock and roll ever about polish over passion?

What’s on your list?

Sure there are a ton of journalist Olympic blogs out there, but in my (semi-biased) opinion, one of the better correspondents in Beijing is the CSM’s Peter Ford. He’s a journalist who has covered stories in Latin America, the Middle East, Europe, and the Soviet Union and he has a knack for getting a story without needing to tart it up or sensationalize the issue at hand.  In the PRC, Peter’s articles are frequently translated/mangled for the Cankao Xiaoxi and the Global Times among other party rags.

The fact that YJ works for the CSM may skew my opinion slightly, but Peter has been linked to enough in this space by Richard and other writers that I feel comfortable plugging their new blog: Olympic Glory.   Check it out.