ARE THEY THERE YET?

The Beijing Olympics 2008. Sounds big and it is projected to be huge event in our neighboring country. The Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG) was established in December 2001, five months after Beijing won the right to host the 2008 Olympic Games. Probably, they have done lot of work in preparation for the games. But, is the preparation is good enough when the Olympics is in less than 7 months?

Beijing City

My recent visit to Beijing was inspiring and informative. You can see that Beijing city dramatically changed in last few years. Shiny skyscrapers were built within short period, as if the mushrooms after the rain. New stores, malls, restaurants, hotels are sprawling throughout the city center. But, you still can smell the nasty smell, as the reminder of cosmetic operation done on old city. Sometimes it is so strong that it makes you gag. As I heard, extensive English training is being done everywhere in Beijing. As I tried to talk with people on the street, they were long way from “speaking” English. Taxi drivers still spoke no English. The good thing that I could point out was that the traffic jam was not so bad, as it were 2-3 years ago.

Air China

The quality of service of Air China flights were poor, flight attendants had no proper English and were not friendly. Whenever they make announcements, I could not make up what they were saying and when they serviced the passengers, you could see the “resentment” on their faces and hear in their words. I felt unwelcomed, poorly serviced. I flew in four flights in and out of two destinations, and all flights had the same food. I just could not believe it. It was either chicken or sea food with rice or noodles. The passengers were crammed like sardines in small Boeing 373. Air China uses small planes, probably to save costs, but its big inconvenience to passengers, where for four and a half hours flight I could not move. Toilets were unclean, tissue paper scattered all over the wet floor, and it had that persistent smell just after 40-50 minutes after takeoff. At least they could do is adjust the seating space to allow more room for passengers. Clean they toilets frequently if they going to cram so many passengers on one small plane. All flights played a video of how Air China became the official partner for Beijing Olympics 2008, and how they are hiring 300 new flight attendants only for Olympics. The candidates are going through very tough selection, harassment, and discrimination in order to service the tourists and visitors for the big event in August.

If I ever go and see the Olympic Games in Beijing this year, I will choose Mongolian Airlines (MIAT), as it serves better food, speak good English (as if I need to speak in English with attendants, keke), planes are not so much crowded, and they are friendly. I have no business with MIAT, but just my personal experience gave the thought of comparing the two.

After seeing, hearing, and smelling all this, I am not sure if Beijing will be ready for the Olympics in time. Probably, the BOCOG will do its best to adhere to the schedule and I would like to wish them luck! All I am left with is a hope for better and permanent changes in Beijing and Air China by the beginning of Big Games.