OlymPicks: Snow and Mud Celebrated as High-Profile Gifts for the Games

OlymPicks is an ongoing blog series whereby we highlight news, gossip, and developments regarding the buildup to Beijing's 2022 Winter Olympics.

In some regions, they’re considered messy, irksome substances that clog roads and sully our clothes. And yet, ahead of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic Games, mud and snow are receiving glowing headlines in both the local and foreign press.

Let’s begin with the white fluffy stuff: As the Associated Press reports, Beijing has formed a “snow affairs work team” for the 2022 Olympics. Because the capital’s snowfall is so low, officials have decided to recruit experts on that frigid precipitation from far chillier locales like Finland and Canada. A "2017 Beijing Fact File" was recently released, detailing these plans and others, and it says the international snow affairs work team would "expedite research on key technologies for making and preserving snow, and start to formulate a work plan to ensure suitable snow resources."

As readers from around the world read about Beijing’s bilateral snowflake endeavor ahead of the 2022 Games, Chinese nationals have been enjoying a more mucky, nostalgic Olympic article in their state media. CCTV just published a gallery on its website titled “The teacher who turned mud into national gifts for the Beijing Olympics.” Said educator is Miao Changqiang, who hails from Henan and makes intricate ceramics. He has been teaching students this dirt-to-treasure trade for the past three decades at the Ceramic Vocational High School, and his work has garnered so much acclaim that he was invited to present some of those finished projects as gifts to hundreds of delegates from around the world at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympic Games. No word yet on whether he’ll return to present more ceramics to delegates at the 2022 Games. We’re also curious if those officials will forgo that mucky warm-weather material in favor of someone who can carve gifts for delegates out of ice, Harbin-style, for the 2022 Winter Olympics.  

Aside from Olympics-related coverage about snow on the ground, to extracting material for artworks from the good earth, there has also been news about ground being broken for some of the 2022 Games’ biggest venues. Inside the Games reported this week that crews have begun working on four venues in the Zhangjiakou cluster that will be used for over 50 events such as snowboarding, freestyle skiing, cross-country skiing, and more. It's just the latest in an ongoing slew of development in the Beijing-adjacent region, from Austria's investment in Zhangjiakou's skiing facilities, to the inking of numerous luxury hotel contracts in the area, with especially rapid development in the Chongli district.

Photos: Associated Press