China’s McDonald’s has organized an event called “McDonald’s Olympic Cheering Little Champions” some time ago. This competition is held to select 100 children from all around China to grace the Beijing Olympics next year. The above commercial is used to spread the message around and I really like the song and the jingle “Ba ba ba ba ba ba” at the end.

Joel, who blogs at China Hope Live, snapped some great pictures of clear days and smoggy days in Tianjin. It’s great to see them side-by-side, it seems we either see brilliantly blue skies with assurances of fresh and clean air by August, or heavy grey smog and prophesies of athletic doom.

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Where did that tower go?

Check out the rest of the pictures here at China Hope Live.

Yesterday I got an email from the BBC asking if I’d like to talk about my recent posts about Christine Ohuruogu for the World: Have Your Say radio program. Pretty exciting!

The discussion was on doping convictions and whether we can even take athletes seriously after so many of them have been caught using performance-enhancing drugs. While I completely support Christine Ohuruogu and the BOA’s decision to allow her to compete in the Olympics, I do think that many athletes are getting a synthetic edge.

Listen to the show online or get the podcast!

From my personal blog about the show:

Just a little hypothetical situation here. In case you live abroad, and all your coworkers speak second-language English, you might get pretty used to speaking very slowly and using the simplest words possible. You may even drop an “I very like” into conversation, or skip an article now and again.

It’s not a problem, until you speak to someone who actually speaks English well. In fact, you might say that radio people speak English for a living. This may make you feel extremely stupid. Not that any of that happened to me, of course.

Christine Ohuruogu appealed her Olympics ban before the British Olympic Association, and won. They ruled that mitigating circumstances in her case, a story that sounds like a genuine misunderstanding and not any dishonesty, make her eligible to compete in the Olympics.

But the BOA said in a statement: “The panel decided that Christine Ohuruogu’s appeal had been successful due to significant mitigating circumstances.”

Ohuruogu, 23, had originally been banned for missing three out-of-competition tests after failing to be at training locations at times she had specified to testers.

I think the FOURTEEN negative drug tests she took in the following year make missing the tests seem like an unlucky mistake, but the BOA had more to say.

“Athletes must be fully aware of their obligations to keep their whereabouts information up to date at all times and must ensure that they are available for testing at the designated times and places.

“The BOA will now be pleased to welcome Christine Ohuruogu as part of Team GB in Beijing next year in the event of her successful nomination by UK Athletics. ”

Via BBC Sport (which is blocked in China… I totally go the extra mile for you guys)

Christine Ohuruogu, a British sprinter, recieved a one-year ban from competitions. The year is up, but she’s still barred from competing in the Olympics. She’s making her case to the British Olympic Association today… er, tomorrow for Brits.

LONDON, Nov 25 (Reuters) - Christine Ohuruogu should be allowed to compete at next year’s Beijing Olympics, according to marathon world record holder Paula Radcliffe.

Ohuruogu returned from a one-year ban to win the 400m at this year’s world championships after missing three out-of-competition drugs tests.

Under British Olympic Association (BOA) rules she is barred from competing for Britain in the Olympics, although she will attempt to overturn that decision at a hearing on Monday.

“I think they will allow her to compete in Beijing,” Radcliffe, an outspoken critic of doping cheats, said in The Observer on Sunday.
“They did (overturn the suspension) on (triathlete) Tim Don and the judo player (Peter Cousins) so there is a precedent there. To be honest she has served her time.

“She has to admit that she made mistakes and that she was in the wrong. She didn’t play by the rules.”

The 23-year-old Ohuruogu has admitted for the first time that she was to blame for missing the tests.

Via The Guardian

Everyone knows that the Beijing National Stadium looks like a Bird’s Nest (鐕曠獫) but can a teapot look like the Olympic Stadium which in turn look like the home of the bird?

Recently in Shanghai, there was a teapot exhibition which featured Purple Sand teapots or Zi Sha Hu (绱�鐮傚６) that came in various different shapes with spiky names such as “The Bird’s Nest Teapot”, “The Space Shuttle Teapot” and “The Four Great Inventions Teapot”.

Purple Sand teapots are named for a tiny city located in the Jiangsu Province, where a specific compound of iron ore results in the unique coloration of these teapots. Exquisite ceramic teapots and tea bowls date to the Song Dynasty in glazes of brown, black, and blue. A bamboo whisk was employed to beat the tea into a frothy confection highly prized by the Chinese.

Of course, these teapots are purely for display purposes.

Via 璇楅�欓泤闊�

While I was flipping through my Weifang pictures in search of the hotel room additions, I found this cute Fuwa kite from last year’s Weifang Kite Festival.

Most hotel rooms I’ve stayed in have a mini-bar with Chinese characteristics, a cabinet full of instant noodles, single-servings of bai jiu, and condoms. It makes me wonder exactly what the staff thinks we want to do in the room.

Here’s a picture of what a hotel in Weifang provided for us:

But in the next year, all Beijing hotels will be required to provide their guests with condoms. How thoughtful!

Beijing, preparing to host the 2008 Olympics, has ordered hotels to provide condoms in all bedrooms in a bid to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS after cases of infection soared 54 percent in the first 10 months of this year.

Via Reuters

The Olympic torch is making it’s way through almost every city in China, but it won’t be visiting Chinese Taipei (or as Americans call it, Taiwan). You can watch the CCTV9 video here.

Via CCTV

Mexico plans to send 120 athletes to compete in the Beijing Olympics. In addition, the Mexican government will be awarding monetary prizes for certain Olympic athletes.

Mexico’s president Felipe Calderon on Tuesday said his government would increase the nation’s budget for sports by 25 percent for athletes attending the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

He also promised at the 2007 National Sports Prize ceremony that the nation’s athletes would have the government’s full support during the 2008 Beijing Olympics

Via Xinhua