Today is one of the clearest days in Beijing, and certainly the clearest in about a month. The sky was blue and clear. Apparently yesterdays rain cleared the skies.
I went to work, where my only assignment was to watch the French compete in the womens gymnastics individual all-around final and interview them if they medaled. They did not, so I joined a friend to explore the Olympic Green a little. Thats when the adventures started.
We heard there was pin-trading outside the MPC (main press center). We didnt find anything in the direction we took outside the security gates, so we figured wed go back through security and find another side of the MPC. We got into the MPC (we didnt have clearance for it), ended up wandering around the basement of the place, twice to blocked-off exits, for a while before we found a security guard to ask how to get out. He led us out past the clothes-washers and cooks to the cafeteria of the MPC.
Once outside, a Chinese- and English-speaking woman approached my friend and I, asking if our volunteer uniforms were the U.S. team uniforms and if we were therefore athletes. Even after she found out we were volunteers and not athletes, she wanted us to take a picture with her two children.
On entering the State Grid pavilion, a staff member informed my friend that she was the 2,008th visitor that day, and we were escorted to the second floor for her to be interviewed and given a gift. Her gift: five books in Chinese, a flashlight that is magnetic and can be used as a night light for a bike rider (you know, the kind with a white light in front and a red one in back), a flashdrive/bracelet, and a hand-held fan that requires three batteries that my friend didnt have. In the spirit of friendship, I asked what I got for being the friend to the 2,008th visitor and was also given a fan that requires three batteries. I didnt have any batteries with me.
That would have been enough of an adventure in itself.
On leaving, someone asked if we wanted to trade pins. We started trading pins, which attracted more pin-traders, which attracted more pin-traders, which attracted more pin-traders we walked 100 feet in 30 minutes. The majority of that ground was covered when my friend made the mistake of giving a pin away to someone to start their collection, which resulted in what she describes as a sudden wall of hands wanting a free pin. She got wide-eyed, grabbed her pin bag and quickly walk away.
If youre looking for internet, the State Grid pavilion has wireless. At least, according to the German woman sitting on the steps outside the pavilion checking her e-mail on her laptop. I felt a little bad for her because when I sat down for a friendly chat with her, two minutes later we were surrounded by people wanting to trade pins.
My favorite exchange of the day:
German man (I had conversations with people of other nationalities today, as well) : Are you volunteers?
Me:
German man: Are you Asian?
Me: (thinking, Did we really just get asked that? Me, with light-brown hair and brown eyes, standing next to a curly-haired blond woman?) Uh, um, no?
German:
Wow.
And for my BA (bonne action) for the day, I helped direct a woman from Reuters find her way to the Birds Nest. She got off metro line 10 to take metro line 8. I suggested the bus would be the fastest way. She was determined to take line 8. A friend (different from the one earlier in the day) and I walked her in the direction of the security lines for line 8. She got almost to the lines, then decided it would be faster to walk. We told her it would take 45 minutes to walk and the subway would take 5 minutes, followed by a 10-minute walk to the Birds Nest. We then told her to go to the farthest security line (reserved for accreditated personnel access) which would be faster than waiting in the ticket-holder lines. I hope she made it in time. But gosh she was hard to convince. That brings my personal count of helping people find their way to three: A Russian journalist, a French personal trainer and now an American journalist with Reuters. And I feel important every time.
Tomorrow: in the morning, well cover the first day of trampoline gymnastics, then several of us have tickets provided by BOCOG to watch athletics in the evening. Itll be my first time inside the Birds Nest.

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