How much do Olympics cost these days?

Well, according to Beijing Vice-Mayor Chen Gang, the total cost of the venues will be about 13 billion RMB (1.22 billion Euros). Of this 3.5 billion RMB will have been spent on the Bird’s Nest. In contrast, the London 2012 Olympics have been set a target of 9.3 billion Pounds (12.52 billion Euros) to cover construction – about 10 times as much. Of course a great number of factors will account for this not least local labour costs, but anyone looking to purchase a Bird’s Nest or Water Cube would be wise, on this evidence, to shop in China.

On the topic of the costs of construction of the Olympic venues, there has been discussion over how many workers have or have not died on sites over the 5 year building period. This stems from a report in the British Sunday Times that “China has systematically covered up the accidental deaths of at least 10 workers, and perhaps many more, in a rush to construct the futuristic ”bird’s nest” stadium in Beijing for this summer’s Olympic Games”. After some toing and froing the official line now seems to be that 6 workers have died; 2 on the Bird’s Nest site, and 4 elsewhere. The Sunday Times article has a vivid account from a migrant worker, that could be representative of the perils that so many of China’s floating population face, though is certainly not exclusive to workers on Olympic venues. It remains to be seen if the Sunday Times keep such a close record of the accidental deaths of works on the 2012 Olympic sites.

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Water cube is unveiled

The Water Cube, less commonly known as the National Aquatic Centre, was officially unveiled today in Beijing. The building will undergo its first test by hosting the China Open swimming championships from Jan 31 to Feb 5.

Things you might like to know:

• The building boasts an LED system with 16.7 million color tones
• It has cost the best part of 100 million Euros and taken over 4 years to build
• It is also the only Olympic venue that is financed by the Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan compatriots
• It will hold up to 17,000 spectators

The official home page is really actually quite good, so check it out for videos and info on the WC. Alternatively try this rather abstract video on youtube for some extra ‘insight’.

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Heading off-road in search of blue skies

News reports this week about the Olympics have been dominated by the publication of the plan to keep half of Beijing’s cars off the road for the duration of the Games this summer. The objectives being to reduce congestion and improve air quality.

The NYT has picked up on this with an interesting interview with ‘the lead exercise physiologist for the United States Olympic Committee, Randy Wilber’. This is accompanied by a particularly interesting supplement which describes the influences on Beijing’s summer climate, as well as the possible effects poor quality air can have on athletes.

There is significant doubt over the possible success of the BOGOC’s plans to cut air pollution, as expressed separately by the NYT. This perhaps is not surprising, after the mixed results of the test carried out last August; “More than a million cars were taken off the roads for the four-day test period, but there was no improvement in the air quality, according to city officials” said the Guardian.

The test certainly reduced Beijing’s much maligned traffic, but impacts on the air quality were less clear. From the Guardian again; “The city’s Olympic organisers declared the test, which ends today, a success. Because there was no wind, they argued, pollution would have grown thicker without the special restrictions.”

Well, this August 1.65 million cars will be taken off the roads in Beijings. Should these measures herald blue skies; should the wild not lend a helping hand; Jacques Rouge, IOC President, has famously raised the possibility of events in “endurance sports like cycling” being postponed.

NYT raises this possibility with Randy Wilber, who is investigating rules over use of asthma inhalers, and even considering use of face masks. With tongue in check, the question is even posed about how athletes should prepare for the Games:

“Should I run behind a bus and breathe in the exhaust? Should I train on the highway during rush hour? Is there any way to acclimate myself to pollution?”

A little over the top perhaps?

The idea of athletes boycotting the Olympics because of the air quality is very sad, and is probably one that appeals to the Western media as an opportunity to show unusual concern with regard to the environment. Though the quality of the air during the Games is a very real concern, it seems unlikely that any athletes would jeopardise their Olympic dreams by staying away. The measures in place, are certainly not permanent solutions to Beijing’s problems, but it would be surprising if they did not fulfill their immediate objectives.

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Deng Yaping – the pressures Chinese Olympic athletes face, from one who knows

Deng Yaping is not a household name outside China. (In fact if you Google her name the intuitive search engine asks if you mean Deng Xiaoping.) But Yaping is one of China’s greatest Olympians having won four gold medals, despite her diminutive height. In contrast her public stature could not be much larger, illustrated by the fact that she was voted Chinese female athlete of the century.

What may distinguish this athlete even more, are her non-athletic achievements. Retiring at the age of 24, she has an undergrad degree at one of China’s most prestigious Universities, and a Masters at the University of Nottingham ( a University which has fostered it’s links to China, and was the founder of the first Sino-Foreign university in China with approval from the Chinese Ministry of Education) and is now working on a PhD at Cambridge. And in a couple of weeks Yaping will celebrate her 35th birthday – as long as responsibilities as a member of the IOC and deputy manager of the Olympic village don’t come in the way, of course.

So, it could be said that there are few people more entitled to speak about the pressures that the Chinese stars will be facing in the home Olympics this summer. This has been discussed here before in reference to Liu Xiang, but it can rightly be related to the table tennis players too, who will have even higher expectations on them.

This story was picked up by TIME. To see a video interview with Deng Yaping, filmed last Autumn, visit CNN.

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Ceremony rehearsal plans announced

Where will you be on 10th July? If you are in Beijing and you call by the National Olympic Stadium you may catch the opening ceremony of the 2008 Olympic Games. Only the rehearsal mind, the dates of which have been announced today.

The announcements do not reveal whether creative director Zhang Yimou or collaborator Steven Spielberg will be there.

Nor does it divulge whether artificial mitigation of rains will be used to guarantee good weather for the rehearsal in the way that it is planned for the main event on 8th August.

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Beijing’s environmental steps forward (and back)

Two articles appeared today that in their conflicting messages seem to epitomise the environmental situation in Beijing leading up the the ‘Green Games‘.

‘Beijing Residents in Environmental Protection‘ reads the headline of an article containing the results of a survey overseen by the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA). “The results showed that Beijing had the most active participation in environmental protection”, which is surely a positive reflection of the impact of the Olympics on the capital’s residents and theirway of thinking.

Meanwhile in the Wall Street Journal today (picked up by TIME) Steven Q. Andrews an experience environmental lobbiest writes from Beijing about the deterioration of the city’s air quality.

“In 2006, of the 84 major cities in China reported by the State Environmental Protection Agency, Beijing had the fewest number of days attaining the national air quality standard — and in 2007, the air quality was even worse.”

In Andrews’ words, this “raises serious questions about Beijing’s commitment to a green Olympics.”

All this on a day when the Chinese press is full of news about new legislation banning ultra-thin plastic bags, and imposing a charge for all plastic bags in shops.

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Nest of dissatisfaction

Ai Weiwei is one of the most prominent artists and architectural designers in China, and colaborated with Swiss firm Herzog de Meuron on design of the structural icon of the 2008 Olympics, the Birds Nest, the Beijing National Stadium.

Given this connection with the Games, it may be a little surprising to head him speaking openly and frankly in his blog about state of China in 2008, and with particular contempt for the goverment. The post has been translated by the China Digital Time.

Ai refers to growing inequality in the country, political corruption, inflation, pollution and lack of human rights.

Of the 2008 Games he says that: “An Olympics far from the will of the people and the spirit of freedom, a national ceremony without the inspiration of the citizenry, a myth so far away from modern civilization, the end result will be endless nonsense and a bore.”

How many people Ai Weiwei’s words speak on behalf of is unclear. However it is perhaps in a perverse way a positive reflection on the changes taking place in China that this voice can be aired. For better or worse it seems the Olympics are certainly destined to play their part in these changes.

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Anxiety about the Olympic Games

As with any Olympic year, the greeting the New Year in 2008 will set a lot of butterflies flapping in a lot of people’s stomachs. The athletes for example (particularly those of the host nation), and of course the organisers. However, the Beijing Olympics will not be like most Olympics (for both reasons within, and out of the control of the organisers).

The excellent China Digital Times this week contains the translation of an article discussing the anxieties of the Chinese people and government towards the coming year. Reasons to be anxious:

The Government 

“The number one anxiety in 2008 for China’s political leaders, is, of course, the Beijing Olympic Games. Whether they will bring China glory or stigma is a major concern in 2008. No one is clearer than China’s leaders that the real issue is not how many medals China can win, not even whether the opening is brilliant, but how much of the dirty linen of China’s political darkness will be aired thanks to the “great Games”.

As already covered in the blog speculation enters many discussions about the Games as to how protests will impact the Games, and how they will be dealt with.

The People 

“While we can’t tell how many people share the regime’s anxiety over the Beijing Olympic Games, no one doubts the general anxiety about the economy in 2008: everyone, rich or poor, officials and populace, is anxious.”

Everyone

Liang Ting describes the “thousands of “petitioners” with grievances of every kind all over the country, who may very well bring their petitions to Beijing over the period of the Olympic Games”. Onlookers may also be anxious that “if various levels of local governments unscrupulously “curtail petitioning” under high pressure from Beijing, more vicious incidents will be produced and China will lose face”.

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What’s the Olympic plot for the Chinese film industry?

Clearly the Olympics are having knock-on impacts across many areas of society (that’s partly what makes them so interesting!). In a thorough article Liz Shackleton and Sen-lun Yu at Screen Daily look at the impacts the Games are likely to have on both domestic and international film industries.

“Within the film industry, there is more of a mood of nervous resignation. Local producers are grumbling about further censorship restrictions, as the Film Bureau attempts to avoid films that portray China in anything but a shining light during the Olympics.”

There is mention of Asia’s biggest ever movie, that is planned to give a national boost of moral in the months leading up to the opening ceremony:

“And it is still the case that the only way to guarantee a blockbuster is to produce a government-endorsed film. All the stops will be pulled out for John Woo’s $80m epic Red Cliff, which is part-financed by state-owned film giant China Film Group Corporation.

“The Chinese government regards the film as a showcase of Chinese culture and wants it released in July in the run-up to the Olympics.”

And…”Exhibitors are also expecting a rash of Olympics-related, quasi-propaganda films for one month before the games, such as Hou Yong’s The One, based on the true story of a Chinese athlete who escaped Japanese-occupied Manchuria to participate in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics. However, they are not expected to set the box office on fire.”

The writers also summarise well the intriguing position that the Olympic games present regarding the media in general:
“The Beijing 2008 Olympics (August 8-24) will either be the biggest international coming-out party that China has ever seen, or a public-relations nightmare, with human-rights protesters spilling onto the streets and the Chinese government unsure how to deal with them.”

Read the whole article, including discussion of quotas on foreign films shown in China and tackling piracy, here.

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The People’s Olympic wish list

China Daily has published the results of a survey asking people what they most wished for from the Olympics (as picked up by China Digital Times). Top of the pile was to be there to see Liu Xiang retain his gold medal in the 110m hurdles final. It seems Mr Liu may have more pressure on him than even the organising committee when The Games roll around.

He has dealt tremendously well with the pressure so far, and claims to revel in it, though the news that he would be training in isolation has prompted speculation over the effects of this pressure. Comparisons are clearly drawn with the jubilant success of Cathy Freeman in 2000 and the farcical drama of Konstantinos Kenteris 4 years later, both in front of expectant home crowds. While american sports blog FanNation fails to name a single US athlete who has ever “garnered the kind of attention that Liu Xiang, China’s 110-meter hurdlers star, will have to contend with in China over the next year”.

Apparently the survey included participants from 49 countries, though the answers do seem to be particularly Chinese-focused.

Other survey results in the China Daily report are less interesting, and fit more into the paper’s standard role of pro-Party organ grinding.

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