Month: August 2008

BEIJING—After six days here of cheering for athletes from Sweden and Argentina and Indonesia and Australia and Serbia and dozens more, it was a welcome sight to see a familiar nation: Philippines.

YES! we can finally proclaim, we’re part of the XXIX Olympiad. You see, around this sprawling city of 15 million residents, you will observe one common scene in each of the 31 Olympic venues: the national flags. And only those athletes competing in that event will have their country’s flag hoisted.

In tennis, obviously, the RP flag was nowhere inside the Olympic Green Tennis Center. Same with badminton where the Asuncion siblings from Manila missed the cut.

In boxing, it was different. As soon as we entered the venue last Wednesday and found our blue-red-yellow-and-white RP flag proudly displayed above the rafters—that was moment to cherish.

At the Pearl Market / Silk Street shop here in Beijing, we posed for a photo with the top RP Olympic official, Bacolod congressman Monico Puentevella….

BEIJING?Next to Yao Ming and the 110-meter hurdler Liu Xiang, the athlete the 1.3 billion Chinese admire the most swings a badminton stick. In this game played by everyone Chinese?from 66-year-olds to those aged 6?he has won, among dozens of trophies, the last two world championships. He’s the Michael Phelps of shuttlecocks; the Tiger Woods of lobs and drop shots.

Two nights ago, we watched Lin Dan. What a sight! For here was an Olympiad who glided on court. He floated. Light on his feet, he didn’t belabor sprinting from right corner to left corner, he tip-toed. Skipped. He drifted. And while others scooted to retrieve shots, he’d hopped like a grasshopper. He’s Mikhail Baryshnikov wearing shorts.

BEIJING—The Temple of Heaven is one of this city’s must-visit sites. Located not far from the Forbidden City, it’s a mecca where tourists congregate.

Well, in my case, being the tennis buff that I am, my “Temple of Heaven” was located at another spot last Monday, the Beijing Olympic Green Tennis Center, where my wife Jasmin and I spent 11 ½ hours (from 10 a.m. until 9:30 p.m.) watching nothing but the green-and-blue courts, yellow balls and red-hot tennis stars.

BEIJING (Originally posted on Aug. 10, 2008)—My watch read “1:45” in the morning and we still had not had dinner. But never mind. Because what transpired the six hours prior was an experience that will forever be etched in memory. The 91,000-seater Bird’s Nest—home of the last Friday night’s Opening Ceremony—we were not able to enter but our excursion was no less dramatic…

The journey started at 5 p.m. Near our apartment of stay here, we were fetched by three Filipinos (one who’s worked here for two years; another who’s studying Mandarin; and one more who’s Qatar-based and is here to watch the Games). They’re Arnold, Jun and Roel. We first rode the bus to the subway station, Xizhimen. From there, we purchased subway cards then headed to the bottom of China’s earth to ride what is now considered one of the largest underground movements on this planet: the Beijing subway.

Despite not carrying Opening Ceremony tickets, we attempted to get near—hoping to watch from a jumbo TV screen there and see the fireworks. But as soon as we emerged in the roadway Gulouwai Dajie, policemen whisked everyone away from the tightly-secured cordon nearing the Bird’s Nest. And so, like hundreds of others, we walked. While strolling along their main road, we saw vehicles of dignitaries—including the speeding limousine carrying US President George W. Bush.

My clock read 7 p.m. Oh no! we thought. With barely an hour left, we had no clue where to watch this most historic moment in China. Studying the map, the nearest subway station was miles away. Trudging on, we walked for 20 minutes until finding a couple of vacant taxis that sprinted us to an area where many congregated: Ditan Park.

Yes! By 7:35 p.m.—with daylight still visible here—we made it. Thousands of people crammed the open space inside this vast greenery of a park named the “Temple of the Earth.” Security checks and guards patrolled the public arena. We found our seats (on the cement floor, of course), my wife Jasmin and I settled just 40 feet or so away from one of two massive TV screens.

As the minutes ticked and the seconds neared, our hearts pounded, our minds inflamed by the celebration, our goose-bumps all-standing. Sitting beside Australians and Italians and Greeks and hordes of other nationalities who’ve all converged to sit beside the Chinese, this was a festivity to commemorate.

Did you watch the hour-long show? And the three-hour parade of athletes? What a production! I don’t have much internet access here (other than the few minutes to send this first-hand account) so I haven’t read the reviews but, I’m sure, all critics will conclude that it was one of history’s most spectacular.

I’ll spare you the details (check out YouTube, they’ll post the official video there, I heard) but must say that it was loaded with surprises, acts of thrill, acrobatics, fireworks!!! and, yes, many, many “goose-bumps moments.”

Our RP delegation? Manny Pacquiao? He stood tall while carrying our flag; though I didn’t see GMA, unlike all the other heads of states who were shown.

How about Roger Federer? From where we sat, no louder applause was heard than when his face was shown, carrying the Swiss flag.

Kobe. Rafael Nadal. Dirk Nowitzki. Manu Ginobli. So many superstars, all lined-up one after the other on the world’s grandest arena.

Then, of course, no figure stood taller than the flag-carrier of the host nation: Yao Ming. When the Chinese flag entered the stadium and out emerged this 7-foot-6 behemoth, the thousands who congregated at Ditan Park stood up, clapped, shouted, waved flags. Our Chinese neighbors, as later translated to us, went agog, all screaming, “GO! CHINA!” This was the moment they had waited for—not the past seven years or for the past 21 Augusts—but since history was founded.

Chinese Pride.

Yes. If there’s one meaning that I’ve absorbed here so far, it’s that: the pride of being Chinese. Observing the many faces here, listening to them blabber, rejoicing in their rejoicing—you can feel how proud they are of their nation. President Hu Jintao? Unlike ours whom we clap for meekly when she’s on TV or, worse, when George Bush’s face was shown on the screen last Friday—boos erupted (among the Americans!).

The Chinese president? You’d never hear as loud a rousing reception. He’s a rock superstar here!

For, what a moment in history for this proud China.

Thanks to James Naismith, they’ve invented basketball. They’ve dominated. Since the game was founded in 1891, the letters U-S-A have lorded over the orange-colored ball that’s shot inside the10-foot-tall ring. In all, the Americans have won 12 of the 15 Olympic basketball gold medals. That’s what you call lordship. Superiority. Monopoly.

Remember the Dream Team? Of course! Remember MJ, Magic, Larry and Sir Charles? In that 1992 Olympics, they dribbled over earth like a ball in Barcelona. Same in Atlanta 1996. And, at the 2000 Sydney Games, they won the only color they knew: Gold.