Larry King, pioneer blogger, threw down the blog-gauntlet with his ellipsis-laden missives?
If you consider the dumpling as ground zero for Chinese food, and you consider the Ling Ling brand dumplings sold at Costco as a worthy jumping off point, then where do the Beijing dumplings rank? I walked from one end of Beijing to the other, north to south, east to west, sampling dozens and dozens upon the way, from street vendors to hole-in-the-wall cafes to fairly nice restaurants, and to be perfectly honest, I found nothing that could match our domestic Costco offerings.
Most of the ones here simply lacked character. The sea cucumber dumplings I tried did have character (or had they simple gone bad?) but I wouldn't be in a big rush to order them again. They love sea cucumbers here, absolutely love them, so next time your cursing those pesky sea cucumbers clinging to the bottom of your single scull, scrape a few off and mail them to a friend in Beijing. You'll be a hero. Dumplings notwithstanding, street food is the best food. Dirt cheap for starters. You can't go wrong with a hearty helping of "bing", which is traditional flat bread, often infused with an egg, although I prefer my bing unadorned. One warm large bing and one cold Yanjing beer costs one thin US dollar.
London 2012, that will be exciting. Rio de Janiero will probably win the 2016 bid. At each Olympics, a special "Olympic Lane" is exclusively reserved on all the major highways for "Olympic Only" traffic. Here in Beijing, that Olympic lane is respected as though Mao himself set down the decree. In Rio, I can imagine kids playing soccer in the Olympic Lane. It'll be complete madness, which makes it all the more fun.
No leaf blowers. Men and women with long, home-made brooms sweeping up fallen leaves.
No graffiti, tagging, stickers, scratched glass on subways. When did we in the US decide it was okay to spray paint anything that wasn't moving?
Trampoline competition is a full medal Olympic sport. Anyone's who has seen the Simpson's episode (fifth season) where Homer puts a trampoline in the back yard... and decides to charge money... will no doubt recall Homer's classic line: "Get off so someone else can get injured." Having seen the competition in person, I still don't get it. How about Whitewater Sculling instead?
What sort of sick society is this where you can't bribe your way past a security guard with an Olympic pin? On the bus... a Westerner is the subject of great, unabashed curiosity. It's really something to be stared at non-stop for an hour.
Volunteers are stationed at every corner... high school kids... not a one of them knows a thing. But they are very helpful.
10 year old kid running up to me in the Olympic park... full tilt sprint... breathlessly asking, "Are you American?" I said yes... and the kid screamed with pure, absolute delight... then turned and ran back from whence he came.
People, young and old, out on the street until late at night. The reason, I was told, is that the apartments are often very cramped... and no AC. The only relief is to hit the streets. Plus there is nothing on TV except shopping channels and bizarre soap operas that involve guys with terrible wigs, bad make-up, magic wands, dragons.
Our planet has lots to fear from China, since a billion-plus people are entering the "gimme" phase of existence. It doesn't help that Audi, an Olympic supplier, has brought over hundreds upon hundreds of pristine, jet black A6 sedans, to be used as taxis for Olympic officials. (These A6's are equipped with a 2.0 liter engine, which is pretty tiny for such a big car, although I suppose it hardly matters since they rarely go over 40 miles an hour in the city.)
Number of Time zones in China - 1
Metal detectors at every venue sound off every time a person walks through... then you get the "Beijing Olympic Massage", a kid running a metal detector wand up and down a half-dozen times. "Turn around please."
Take that, Larry King.
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