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A corner of the Yuanmingyuan, the sprawling summer palace of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) Emperors, has been opened to the public for the first time since it was set aside 301 years ago as an imperial playground.
Paths and bridges are still being laid among the ruins, but officials are determined to have it ready in time for Friday's opening of the Beijing Olympics, which China hopes will be the most spectacular Games of modern times.
Beijing has spent $40 billion (£20 billion) and spared no effort to achieve that goal. It seems the capital has come full circle.
The city was first built 700 years ago by Mongol invaders who founded the Yuan Dynasty as an imperial capital to shock and awe visitors. Preparations for the Olympics have been on a similar extraordinary scale.
As well as building a huge airport terminal, three underground lines and an ultra-modern theatre complex, China closed the heart of the Forbidden City, one of its premier tourist attractions, for more than two years for restoration to make sure that Beijing shows its best face to the world.
Hundreds of factories have been shut and half of the capital's cars taken off the streets in an attempt to clear its polluted skies.
Hu Jintao, President and Communist Party chief, in a rare meeting last week with 25 foreign journalists, urged the world not to confuse politics and sport during the Games. Members of his own Government have, however, painted a different picture.
Wei Jizhong, a former official of the Chinese Olympic Committee and a senior consultant for the Beijing organisers, said: “The Olympic Games is not simply a sports event and its meaning is beyond sports itself.”
The creation of two of the most striking sports venues on Earth — the Bird's Nest national stadium and the Water Cube for aquatic competitions — sums up China's ambitions.
The not-so-subliminal message that the venues are determined to project is that China is a force to be reckoned with, a nation that has left behind its humiliation by foreign powers in the 19th century and emerged from the chrysalis of communist central planning as a prosperous modern state.
Geremie Barme, a China scholar, wrote: “The 2008 Olympics will provide a unique opportunity for China to show the world a vision of itself, and what it has to offer as a nascent global power.”
Athletes from across the globe will fly into the biggest air terminal in the world, its roof jagged with golden triangles resembling the scales on the back of the dragon that for centuries symbolised imperial power.
They will run and jump inside a national stadium that cost £250 million to build and needed 41,875 tonnes of steel to create the lattice in which it is cradled.
The city they will visit has been decorated with 40 million plants. An entire forest has been planted in the Olympic Park, whose position was carefully chosen with the advice of fengshui masters so that it sits astride the north-south axis, or dragon's vein, on which Emperors based their capital and their right to govern with the mandate of heaven.
More than 100,000 volunteers, chosen from among nearly one million applicants, will be on hand to help tourists befuddled by the rules and the language.
A 110,000-strong security force has been mobilised, including 34,000 troops of the People's Liberation Army with 74 jets, 48 helicopters and surface-to-air missiles protecting the main stadiums.
The fireworks at the opening ceremony are being billed as the greatest pyrotechnics show the world has ever seen - in the country that invented gunpowder.
On rare display in the halls of the Forbidden City will be one of China's most renowned paintings, the 10th-century Night Revels of Han Xizai.
A day before the Games, Beijing will open the city's old merchant quarter, which has undergone a $1.3 billion makeover.
Amid these staggering achievements, however, the world's fourth-largest economy cannot hide a fit of nerves.
While some usually inaccessible websites have been unblocked, many more remain hidden behind China's Great Firewall or filtered by cautious censors.
Security is such that hardly anyone without a ticket is being allowed to travel to the capital and a teacher who posted photographs of schools that crumbled in the devastating May earthquake has been sent to a labour camp for a year.
The security blanket, the absence of tourists and a barrage of new rules and regulations are, however, stirring barely a ripple of discontent, although some among the elite voice a few doubts.
One prominent artist said: “I feel further and further away from the Olympics. Every day there is a new rule that pushes me away. I will just watch television.”
And a senior newspaper commentator said privately: “These are called the Olympic Games. Games means fun. But I don't see much sign of fun and games.”
An underlying theme has been whether China has been right to spend so much on a glorification project when 200 million of its citizens are still living in poverty.
What is striking, though, is that the Chinese are delighted to be playing host to the Games.
Liao Zhenzhi ferries tourists around Beijing's old alleys in a pedicab and is busiest at weekends. Yesterday he sat and fanned himself. “Business is bad,” he said. “There are no visitors and I guess there will be even fewer when the Olympics start. But,” he added, “this is a great moment for China.”
It is rare indeed to find anyone who does not take pride in the Games.
Back at the old summer palace, in a shallow lake where Emperors once frolicked far from the prying eyes of their people, four sun-baked workers stripped down to their underpants to clear beds of reeds.
One leant on his rake. “This place used to be forbidden to ordinary people like us. But now everyone can come. That's pretty amazing, isn't it?”
Thinking big
— 51 months to build the Beijing National Stadium, or Bird's Nest
— 91,000 spectators seats
— 7,000 extra buses will run in Beijing
— 137,000 miles will have been covered by the Olympic flame by the time it arrives
— 21,800 torchbearers
— 15,000 people are in the opening ceremony
— 10,708 athletes are competing for 302 gold medals in 28 sports at 37 venues in seven host cities
— 4bn are expected to watch
— 5,400hours of broadcasting by Beijing Olympic Broadcasting, the official broadcaster of the Games
下面是译文 英国《泰晤士报》4日发表文章，称中国已经花费400亿人民币希望打造“现代史上最壮观的奥运会”。尽管政府出台了一系列规定保障奥运会安全运行可能会影响普通人的正常生活，但总体而言中国人民对于中国能举办本届奥运会深感自豪。
除了建造首都机场3号航站楼——世界最大的单体航站楼外，中国还建了3条地铁奥运支线和超现代化的剧场，关闭故宫主要参观区域两年多进行修缮，使她向世人展现最好的面貌。
而为了保证北京奥运空气质量，北京周边地区数百家工厂关闭，北京一半汽车停驶。
《泰晤士报》指出，“鸟巢”和“水立方”体现了中国的雄心壮志。这些场馆传达了一个信息，即中国必须被认真对待，她已经抛下了19世纪的屈辱史，发展为繁荣现代的国家。
中国国家主席胡锦涛于8月1日会见25名国外记者，呼吁不要把政治和体育混为一谈。中国奥委会前副主席、北京2008奥组委高级顾问魏纪中认为“奥运会不仅仅是体育比赛，它的意义大于体育运动本身。”
《泰晤士报》还列举了北京为举办本届奥运会做的其他工作。例如，从100万名申请者里挑选出的10万奥运会志愿者，从中国军队中安排34000多兵力直接参与奥运安保工作，将在奥运会开幕式上表演“最伟大的烟火秀”。
随后，《泰晤士报》指出，作为世界第四经济大国，中国“无法掩饰其神经紧张”。虽然地毯式安保措施、减少游客以及一系列新规定没有引起太大异议，但少数人持怀疑态度。
最后，《泰晤士报》提及中国人很高兴能担任奥运会东道主。北京老胡同三轮车师傅廖振志（音译）说奥运会开始后游客可能会很少，但奥运会对中国来说是个伟大的时刻。很难发现有哪个中国人不为中国能举办奥运会感到自豪。
转载地址：
新民华人网独家稿件
http://news.xmhuaren.com/xinmin/2008/08/05/1149351.html
[ 本帖最后由 olive_fang 于 2008-8-7 12:47 编辑 ] |
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狗仔卡
发表于 2008-8-6 11:12
提升卡
变色卡
抢沙发
千斤顶
显身卡
楼主
发表于 2008-8-6 11:40
真想上去打那脑残一顿，在把他遣送到西藏认识下什么是西藏，白痴
