1 week to the Olympics, Me Ol' China!

"i am a chinese guy, and i just find the site recently for i have a room for rent. but i find many chinese girl said " i am young sexy , want to have fun, if only you are a white man." this kind of words just make me sick. i can't believe chinese girls can be so disgusting.

do you think by doing this you can get the ture love, wake up silly girls.

we r chinese, should respect yourself. i think though we r not very rich now, we can be very rich in the future.
but don't low yourself to get a shameful greencard. "

An odd way to start my blog but I think that the guy writing it 1. is absolutely right 2. he ended up in the wrong section of the site he mentions.

The Beijing 2008 and People's Republic of China flags are multiplying and roads and cars all have one or more flags waiving. A sign of pride that this people has got and that Western media has contributed to grow, jointly with the disgraces that China had to suffer this year that was meant to be the lucky one. Pointless reminding them again as, if you read this Blog you are certainly aware of what happens in the world and in the country hosting me.

The news of the week is that Beijing Railway Station has reopened on August 1st. that is a fantastic news and confirms my impression that it was closed for wrong design and not for security reasons. Before May in the subway there were just the two ticket controllers and some guards by the tracks keeping you behind the yellow line. nowadays there are at least 4 people at the metal detecting machines, some sort of volunteers (quite a few), machine gun equipped policemen, a few security guards, some more policemen down on the track and a few more volunteers. let's say that at my subway station I counted, this morning, 25 people, of which 9 people at my exit. considering that the exits are 4 we are talking of 4 football teams at least! and in the streets? Volunteers every-bloody-where. Another change is the announcement of the trains in the subway stations. A nice voice informs you to "mind the gap" and about approaching trains in both Mandarin and English. Well done!

Big big smiles great you all over. As you know I love this people and their smiles but now it looks like they are all working for a toothpaste manufacturer, showing their teeth all the times. Until last week nobody would have asked me where I was from and if I were her for the Olympics. This week I got asked the question so many times, even in the restaurants I have been eating for 6 months! It looks like if this is a sort of "How are you?" our Yankee friends use without really meaning that they care how you are. I decided to answer every time with a different country and so far I have been Italian, Andorran, Brazilian, British, Ukrainian and Saudi. Another novelty is the warning that some food contains pork! Before the Olympic fever started getting hotter, they would have never informed me that this or that food contained pork. Now they all tell me that the things I am taking contain pork and this doesn't stop after you order the first dish with pork meat. If you order three or four dishes with pork they will tell you all the times that there is pork in it. It reminds me of an old manager I had the pleasure to work with that when he was in Lagos, Nigeria, taught his servants to say the British equivalent of "bullshit!" in Italian. He told them that it meant, "nice to meet you" in Italian. when the Board of Director of the company went to visit the office in Lagos, all the servants were lined up and at every hand shake by the guests they were replying with a loud "bullshit!". Well over here seems the same. It is just a sentence they have been told to repeat. How about English speakers? How can be possible that until last week nobody spoke English and now they all make the effort to speak it? Even those who didn't show any familiarity with the language? Shocking!

Weather and traffic measures... Reduce the cars around and increase the smog... amazing! only China can do that! so, it means that the reason of the pollution is somewhere else. Right? Where? I think it's the A/C, as I mentioned in the comments I published to last week Blog but I am really not sure. Another incredible thing is the reduction of the cars has created an increase in traffic... Amazing innit? not if you think that most of the main roads with 3 lanes each direction have now the Olympic Lane that is used only by... by... by whom? I don't know but definitely not by car drivers. this means that the reduction of 25% of the cars circulating has been compensated in many big arteries by the reduction of the 33% of the lanes available, increasing, in real terms, the traffic by 8%. not bat at all! Of course this is only partially true because most city roads do not have this lane but, there has been a huge increase of bus lines and buses do pollute more than cars, especially the old ones.

I am really pissed off with the Western media about the story of the internet censorship. I would like to ask our Dutch friends if they go to Italy, they expect to smoke some hash in the local cafe', or if a Turk coming to Italy expects to smoke in a restaurant, or an Italian going to Germany to find Scientology and so on. Or, even worse, if you commit a crime in a country where the Death Penalty for drug smuggling (or even detention)is the usual punishment, you claim to be Dutch.

Wake up guys! I do not really understand why a journalist coming for the Olympics should have access to Falun Gong website or Amnesty International ones? Why the hell a journalist should access internet from Beijing to look at those sites? Is it legal to watch pornography in the UK? Every bloody excuse is good to attack. there are ways to look at them anyway, and we all know this, so, please, stop with this crap! I found already a few adverts around of some Western journalists looking for "company" over here. it would be just nice to prepare some traps and publish their pictures on some Western website while they enjoy professionals' services! Fucking hypocrites!

In the meantime, in a very smart move, Beijing has removed the censorship from some sites amongst which Medicines Sans Frontieres and Amnesty. I am sure that now the journalist will have plenty of material to work on! Yes, because they couldn't get that kind of information while they were here and it would have jeopardised he quality of their articles! I checked some gay sites and yes, they are available from here, and same for the major Adult dating ones! Enjoy guys!!!


Anyway, one week to the start of the Olympics, one week before Beijing will have 4 billion eyes on. I really do not like the idea of you guys spying on me and I dread the idea of what will be written on the papers about China and the Chinese. I have seen something on the italian newspaper laughing at the fact that the police over here uses some Beach Umbrella to shelter thmseles from the sun while on duty on the roads. I really do not understand what they find so funny about it and I am sure that there will be many things that will make the Western world laugh but I stick to my Chinese friends rather than by my arrogant siblings.

A thought to my country. A girl that has been in a coma for 16 years obtained the right to die and stop being fed forcedly with drips. The Parliament has voted with the majority of votes to challenge the Court decision. In the meantime the girl will be kept alive for some more time. The right to die is not something that my country allows. Only di Pietro government supported the right of the girl's parents to see the daughter die, while the Democratic Party abstained and all the right wing block and the Catholics supported the government proposal to over rule the decision. Another occasion missed for being a free country.

But the news I really loved and made me think a lot is the one coming from Israel where PM Olmert will resign his post to be trialed for corruption while in my country PM Berlusconi has resigned as defendant to run the country as PM. Different culture, different people. Olmert declared to be proud of a country that treats all people alike, including him, while Berlusconi says the exact opposite. What a fucked up country I come from!

Anyway Folks, leave you now.

Oh, I forgot! Last week outing was in a very luxurious 5 start hotel 90 minutes drive from the city centre but still Beijing. Food, facilities and all the rest were really tip top! Absolutely great. I had a great time and I ate soooooooooooooo much! love you and leave you. Busy weekend the one coming. that's why I anticipated the publication of the blog again. take care folks and if you are coming to Beijing, let me know, we might meet for a coffee, you pay! If you have enough money to come here you have enough money to pay a coffee for your Old China!

kisses and hugs!