Ticket Frenzy

It has always been my dream to actually attend events at the Olympic Games... apparently this is the same exact dream as hundreds of thousands of Chinese people. The moment the announcement came that tickets would be on sale again on July 25th people showed up with their tents, mats, beer, cards, even their dogs to wait in lines. I thought I would surely be able to score tickets if I spent the night at the athletics stadium before it opened at 9am the following morning. Then I heard that there was actually a schedule- basketball and baseball on the 25th, track on the 26th, gymnastics on the 26th, etc. I made plans to secure my spot in line the next night. By the next morning rumors about the pandemonium at the ticket venues were swirling. No one had prepared for the mobs. No guards, no fences, absolutely no organization. Some of my friends who had waited for tickets said metal barricades had been bent, people had been trampled, and no tickets had actually been purchased. People who had waited for days in the heat (mid 90s) and smog (lung cancer waiting to happen) were knocked over and passed by those who had just arrived. Imagine the running of the bulls but with Chinese people. The "schedule" of ticket sales was abandoned and they sold out of pretty much everything within 24 hours.

Needless to say, I decided to try another approach. I began scouring craigslist.com, which resembles eBay, but more like classified ads on the internet (so no bidding, just selling). Of course tickets were much more expensive than face value, but still much cheaper than expected. After lots of emails and close calls I finally have tickets in hand for the night session of track and field on the 19th, including:

Women's 200m Round 2
Men's High Jump Final
Women's 5000m Round 1
Men's 200m Semifinals
Men's 110m Hurdles Round 2
Men's Discus Throw Final
Men's 400m Semifinals
Women's 400m Final
Women's 100m Hurdles Final
Men's 1500m Final

But of course the ticket buying became a fever... I found out that tickets were not yet sold out for softball (not at all popular in China) so I rushed to the venue. Stephanie and I managed to get class A tickets to USA vs. Canada and China vs. Australia in the same session! The kicker- they were only 50 yuan, which is $7 each! All tickets for all events at face value were $110 or less. I honestly expected prices to be between 200-700 dollars for the Olympics. That's the blessing of exchange rates.

I have a few other ticket options pending, including beach volleyball and another track and field. Swimming sold out long before I even got to China.

The smog was terrible today. I have a picture above. You might think it's just foggy, but really it's smoggy. I feel like I'm breathing second hand smoke all day. Journalists were able to enter the country today so I'm interested to see what they have to say...

On a more positive note- my uniform is pretty cool! Oh, and I hijacked one of the scooters at the venue. They're harder to ride than I though! hehe My supervisor, Jessie, is really sweet. Today she taught me how to count and ask a taxi driver 'how much further' in Chinese. We've been preparing for the journalists' arrival by setting up the press workroom and trying to think of all the questions they might ask us so we can be prepared with answers. The test field hockey match proved that we are still a little unorganized...

Tonight Sam, Regan, Lindsay and I found a little hole in the wall dumpling restaurant that restored my faith in Chinese food. The place is famous for their multicolored (dyed) dumplings. Was a little weird eating a purple one, but good nonetheless!

The picture at the bottom from L to R is me, Wendy, and Stephanie.