A couple of hundred yards from our home is the Rosedale Hotel. Suddenly, a couple of days ago, a kiosk landed, like the tardis, on the pavement outside. We have all inspected the kiosk, which so far remains locked and – apparently – unoccupied. On the outside there are pictures of a few foreigners asking directions outside the Olympic stadiums, and a sign saying 'Volunteer.'
But increasingly it looks as though there won't be many foreigners asking directions. Reports are coming in thick and fast of people turned down for visas, even if they have Olympic tickets. One American woman told me her sister had been in a queue in a consulate in the States, in which every single person in the queue was turned away because they had inadequate paperwork. Some of them may sort their papers out – they need hotel vouchers, tickets, flight bookings, etc etc – but some never will, or will still be turned down. China's government is in an alarmingly paranoid mood.
Today I had an alarmingly paranoid taxi driver, who spoke angrily about European leaders who had decided not to attend the Olympic ceremonies. 'Suppose you have a neighbour you don't like, ' he said, 'if his son is getting married, you don't cause trouble on the day.' He told me it didn't matter if foreigners didn't come, Beijing wasn't holding the Games to make money, unlike other countries. He said the most important thing was safety, there had never been an assassination in Beijing since the beginning of the People's Republic, and there wouldn't be at the Games. He happened to liver near the Olympic stadium, and told me that the security guards in his building would all have to leave town because they were migrant workers who would be banished. Because of the building's proximity to the stadia, these doormen would be replaced with People's Armed Police.
I walked around the perimeter fence of the Bird's Nest today. It has become quite a tourist pull, and there were groups of people taking photographs or having their photograph's taken against the backdrop of the building. There were also two men there who had cycled carts to Beijing from in one case Zhejiang and in the other case Yunnan. They sleep in their red and yellow decorated carts, or sleep rough. They had decorated their carts with pro-Olympic slogans. Once I've worked out how to post photos, I'll post some. One had his head shaved in a kind of Olympic sculpture. He said that even once the Olympics were over, he would devote his life to the Olympics. Neither of them had any tickets to attend sports events. They were both, I suspect, pretty close to crazy.
These eccentrics were the one colourful and human splash in what was otherwise a grey, over-sized and bleak landscape. You've all seen photos of the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube. But it was another building that freaked me out. Pangu Plaza is vast – I can't begin to describe it's huge arrogance – and shaped like a dragon, the iconic representation of China. It will house a seven star (seven??) hotel, and an apartment complex offering homes that cost millions of dollars.