Beijing Digest – Sep 24
Tour the Olympic Venues
The Bird’s Nest, Water Cube, National Indoor Stadium and the Olympic Village will all be opened to the ticket-buying public from Sep 29 to Oct 5. If you’re planning on going, be warned that it’s likely to be very crowded and that you’ll need to get your tickets in advance as no tickets will be on sale at the venues.
How to get Tickets
Tickets are being handled by Ticketmaster China and can only be purchased from five ticket offices around town, we’ve listed three of them below. However, long lines have been reported at Gongti with some tickets already selling out and scalpers are already offering tickets at twice the original price.
North Gate of Worker Stadium
Sep 22-Oct 5, 9am-7pm.
East Gate of Beijing Tennis Center
Sep 22-Oct 5, 9am-7pm.
Qianmen Dajie
Sep 22-28, 10am-7pm.
for more details about tickets call 6551 6593 or 6538 8359 between 9am-6pm.
Bird's Nest
80,000 tickets available per day. RMB 50. On sale from Sep 22.
9am-7pm.
Water Cube
12,000 tickets available per day. RMB 30. On sale from Sep 25.
Daily 10am-5pm (limit of 45 min per visit).
National Indoor Stadium
20,000 tickets available per day. RMB 20. On sale from Sep 22.
9am-5.30pm; Oct 1, 1pm-6.30pm; Oct 3, 9pm-4pm.
Olympic Village
8000 tickets available per day. RMB 20. On sale from Sep 22.
9am-7pm
You can also purchase a four-venue package ticket for RMB 100. Visitors with any of the above tickets will also be able to visit the central zone of the Olympic Green but this does not include access to the Olympic Forest Park.
Tickets to the Olympic Forest Park
Getting tickets to the Olympic Forest Park will be even harder, These tickets will not go on sale, but will be distributed through official community and neighborhood committees. It seems as if the tickets are being treated as some kind of reward for all the effort put in by the neighborhood volunteers during the games. We’re not sure how they’ll react to a request for a ticket from a waiguo pengyou. To find out details of your local neighborhood committee and the “spiritual civilization office”(市精神文明办) call 5192 7202 this week during business hours or search this site (Chinese language only).
Cleanest Air all Year
Despite all the cars returning to the road, yesterday saw the capital register its best air quality numbers for 2008. According to the statistics from Beijing Environmental Monitoring Center, the API reading for Tuesday, Sep 23 was 12.
Update on Milk Safety
From today, dairy products being sold in the capital came with a small sticker attached assuring customers that the product is melamine-free. The sticker is especially designed to mark those products that were produced before Sep 18. Dairy products with the little green sign attached include those produced by affected brands such as Mengniu, Yili and Guangming. For dairy products produced after Sep18, authorities advise consumers to simply look for the regular "QS" sign. As of 9am yesterday, 7074 tons of dairy products had been pulled from shelves around the country, this number includes 4246.7 tons of milk powder, 1562.1 tons of liquid milk and 1265.2 tons of Sanlu baby formula.
Foreigners get their Money Back
Relatives of an American athlete who found an apartment online (we hope it wasn’t through our own classifieds!) in February this year, had there USD 10,000 returned to them after the conditions of the place failed to live up to those advertised. Today’s Beijing News reports that police helped the foreigners recover the deposit after they confirmed that the 3-room apartment equipped with air conditioning, shower, water heater, located near the Bird’s Nest and hooked up to the internet was actually a 2-room apartment with a broken air conditioner and water heater and no internet access.
Baby Hippo at Beijing Zoo
A 15-year-old hippo gave birth to her 7th calf at Beijing Zoo’s Hippo & Rhino Hall yesterday. According to the Beijing News, the 30kg baby hippo is likely to be able to meet visitors to the zoo during the National Day holiday.
Links and Sources
The Beijing News: 参观鸟巢门票50元
The Beijing News: 鸟巢门票被炒“翻番”