In the last two weeks I have heard the Chinese national anthem more times than I have in the rest of my life put together. Although I’m sure any avid Olympics viewer is starting to become familiar with the song, being in Beijing this summer means that those notes follow you everywhere. Not only is every television in the city tuned into the Olympics, but the new buses, subway stations, and subway cars are all equipped with TV screens so you won’t miss a single moment. Montages of gold medal moments air in between all programming, so in a given day I could see the same flag rise at least twenty times. It’s gotten to the point where I saw a group of inebriated Germans singing the Chinese national anthem on the Olympic Green and wasn’t surprised that they hit all the right notes.
Needless to say, the Olympics have consumed Beijing, but despite the constant excitement over the gold medal count, the overall rhythm of the city has slowed to an eerily calm pace. With a population of 17 million, Beijing always feels over-crowded and would never be described as spacious, let alone empty, but that’s what its been like since the Olympics began. What used to be twelve continuous hours of traffic now comes in 30 minute spurts. Even during rush hour in the busiest parts of town, there is personal space for everyone to stand on the bus or subway instead of the usual danger of being trapped in the closing doors.
Some of the absences are the intended effects of Beijing’s extreme Olympic makeover. Migrant workers (an estimated 4 million people, according to the New York Times) were strongly encouraged by the government to return home during the Olympics and many homeless were persuaded to relocate to less prominent areas of the city. Even the number of foreign visitors has been restricted (except for those with the Golden Olympic Tickets, of course), and all non-essential business visas have been postponed until mid-September, when the Paralympics end. Additionally, all universities hosting events on campus were to stop classes and any other activities before the Olympics began, meaning that most of the large study abroad programs in Beijing ended earlier than usual and the bustling foreign student population dwindled to next to nothing.
All these restrictions were supposed to be canceled out by the expected influx of Olympic spectators. Instead, the foreign visitor population is lower than what it was before the opening ceremonies, with many hotels reporting 20 to 30 percent less business compared to last year according to The Economist. In all the events I’ve attended, foreigners make up at most 5 to 10 percent of the audience members, even in sports with no hope for a Chinese athlete in the finals, like kayak slalom.
What surprised me most was not the lack of foreign visitors but the lack of audience members in general. The Chinese media excitedly exclaimed to the world that it had sold out the record breaking 6.8 million tickets to the games, yet at every event there were always more than a handful of empty seats. When I attended the individual apparatus gymnastics finals, an entire section of the stadium was empty despite forlorn gymnastics lovers holding up bilingual signs asking for tickets outside the subway station.
The majority of empty seats I’ve seen have been in the sections reserved for sponsors and VIPs, demonstrating that the spectators at the Beijing Olympics, contrary to many preconceptions, are not mostly foreign visitors or the rich and well-connected Chinese elites. Instead, most of the audience is the average Chinese citizen. The Chinese government heavily emphasized equality in obtaining Olympic tickets, so in order to procure them, most Chinese citizens had to win the online ticketing lottery or spend days waiting in line outside venues. The tickets were heavily subsidized to be affordable for the majority of people, with prices running as low as 30 Renminbi ($4 U.S.), while most general admission tickets cost 100 RMB ($15 U.S.) for preliminaries and 500 RMB ($73 U.S.) for finals.
Maybe this end result is the exact target audience the Chinese government wanted, as thousands of citizens flood the Olympic venues to watch the Chinese flag rise to the top again and again, many with tear-filled eyes. Regardless of how the rest of the world will remember the 2008 Olympics, be it the intricate weaving of the Bird’s Nest or the impossibly tiny female gymnasts, the Chinese people will recall the sense of patriotism and pride that hosting the games gave them.
