The last 24 hours in Beijing.

Here are some pictures taken in my last 24 hours in Beijing:

The Aquatic Center at night. Apparently the National Stadium (Bird's Nest) glows red. I can't wait to see them together at night!

A back-lit Olympic ad in the subway. These cute little critters are the mascots. Does anyone remember Sam the Eagle from the 84 Olympics held in LA? I remember having a little stuffed Sam and some Sam stickers. I believe they came in a happy meal. Either way, I'll take any of these over the pathetic Izzy from Atlanta games... ugh.

Half-cooked squid-on-a-stick!!! Yep, these guys are my Canadian counterparts and were at least a few beers in before attempting this leap of culinary faith.

MMMMM, taste the flavor! (or flavour, if you're Canadian)

My Aussie buddy, Luke, eating some snake-on-a-stick. Apparently, according to all the vendors, eating snake is very "Good for penis!" They also claim this about the squid, scorpion, and pretty much everything else they sell. "You buy silk worm! Good for penis!"

When I return in July, I'll ask Luke how it's going down there.

Quik-E-Mart!

Many purchase electrics sign have make for poor translations. Also, check out the guy welding with no safety equipment or ladder.. hey! shouldn't he be smoking and drinking, too? oh yeah, I think he was. never mind.

Yet another McDonalds. This time, no English at all!!!

Maxxin and chillaxin near Tienanmen Square.

Here is one of the mobile video trucks that will mostly likely be with us during the games. This day it happened to be filming in Tienanmen.

I didn't take any pictures, but these guys we shaking a lot of people down and checking their bags. Not in a violent way or anything, but definitely showing their presence.
They are watching you!

Gimme some Mao!

A very quaint little garden path just on the other side of the wall. Apparently someone was doing some water calligraphy on the sidewalk.

How do you say "hipster" in Mandarin?

Well, that's all for now. I return to Beijing on July 21st and will remain there until August 25th. Please check back for more fun-in-the-East! Also, don't forget to comment :)

-Sean

Amazing!

Let me start by saying that this will undoubtedly be one of the greatest experiences of my life. If not only for the self-satisfaction of being able to wrestle one of the biggest and complicated networks during the biggest event in broadcast history to date, but for the simple fact that I'm am getting to work with such a diverse team of really wonderful people from all over the world.

To see people pulling together from all corners of the planet and in all walks of life is quite an amazing thing to behold, especially being one of the few Americans involved. It makes me realize more and more that we are a nation very much closed off from the rest of the world. Get a passport and travel, people!!!


ok. Here's a bunch of pictures in random order. For some reason blogspot makes it very difficult to arrange your pictures.

the Olympic Basketball Stadium

some construction with the obligatory crouching Asian guy

the National Stadium a.k.a the "Birds Nest." This is the main venue for the Olympics and will host the opening and closing ceremonies.

the inside of the Aquatic Center. it's hard to relay the awesomeness of this in a picture. the whole building is comprised of a carefully orchestrated jumble of hexagonal membrane "bubbles" and a series of structural trusses that represent molecules. truly amazing.

i was there!

trying to capture the scale of everything

the diving platforms

outside

inside the IBC (International Broadcast Center.) the scale of this operations center completely dwarfs anything I have ever seen in my life. they even have brand new 103" plasma TVs. yes, that's 103", not cm. I'll take more pics of them later.

crazy westerners and their cameras!

some more shots of the "bubble building"

some natural support systems

neon, LEDs, and incandescents, oh my! and, oh yeah, that car is grinning quite cutely.

at the "night market." finally, some bugs on a stick!!! there were also snakes, sea horses, squid, and a bunch of other random disgusting - yet very sanitary looking - stuff on sticks.

yummy!!!

and now, your moment of Zen:

thanks for checking out my blog! sorry the updates have been slow.. between my erratic internet connection and my even more erratic sleep schedule it's been tough getting things uploaded. hopefully this will all be fixed when I come back in July.

Walking around.

Last night I decided to walk around the hotel a little bit before I went to sleep. Here are a few pictures:

Hello, Beijing!

Well folks, I'm here in Beijing. It's a huge city with a whole lot going on. First thing to note when in Beijing is that the people drive like maniacs. It makes a ride in a New York yellow cab feel like Driving Miss Daisy.

My flight was about 13 hours long and I arrived at around 4:00pm local time today, Monday March 3rd. I left Washington DC at 8:30am yesterday (Sunday). I'm a half day into the future here and my body doesn't know quite what to do. It's around 5:00am in Baltimore so I guess I've been up for about 24 hours now, give or take the small amount I snoozed on the plane. FYI if you're still have your calculator out it's 13 hours ahead of EST.

Tomorrow I start the first of four days of preliminary training for my job at the IBC (International Broadcast Center) for the Olympics. I am here in my hotel room as I write this.. my very, VERY swank hotel room at the Marco Polo Beijing. Check it out:

view from near the front door













and check out this BATHROOM!!!!!! SWANK!



wow... amazing. I think it's about time that I take this bathroom for a spin. I'll post again tomorrow.

-Sean

p.s. miss you Babycakes!