spectacle

Today's press claims 4 billion people watched the 2-3 hour Beijing opening ceremony yesterday.

That's 66% of the world's total population. After removing 10% for, say, 0-4 year old children and making an allowance for TV coverage only being to 89% of the world, then we're at circa 5.3bn 'available viewers'. So now we are at 75% of the available population.

I missed it yesterday, because it was screened around midday in my working UK day and then I was out in the evening. So did the people I was with, for similar reasons.

And these folks in Beijing didn't make it either, because the road was blocked off.

Judging from today's pictures in the UK press, it was quite a spectacle.

There seems to be no end of great photo opportunities from the ceremonies as well as the inevitable photography of the passing politicians such as Mr Bush, who stopped by at the womens' beach volleyball.

Naturally there was some offbeat BBC coverage of smog from their hotel window.

And we mustn't forget the sports photography, which also seemed attracted to early coverage of the same sport as some of the politicians. The Norwegian volleyball team has never been so popular.

Of course, some of the early events were on the beach because of the opening ceremony in the stadium. The Bird's Nest Stadium cost $250m and the $40m opening ceremony was 13 months in preparation. China is reported to have spent $40bn on staging the event in total.

Our UK budget is reputedly $18.5bn for construction and around $4bn to run the Games using 'temporary' stadiums in an East London 'dust bowl' according to Tessa Jowell. I'm not sure that she should be using those words actually. She did say that Beijing would be the last iconic stadium, although the one we are building is predicted to cost twice as much. Admittedly these are also the 2007 estimates, so things might have changed.

At least Great Britain's 313 athletes for the Beijing games will be safe in the knowledge that we've reportedly sent 639 public servants to keep them company and to find out how its all done in time for our turn. Gordon Brown only needs 20 aides and Boris is making do with 13.

In fairness, around half of the £6.8m budget travel budget is for the 437 BBC staff providing Beijing television coverage. So the taxpayers' governmental and police based coverage is only 202 people. But you can get your virtual Beijing rashbre central ticket here.

Technorati Tags: rashbre, beijing, opening, ceremony, birdsnest, stadium, dust+bowl, tessa, jowell, bush, volleyball, norway, china, viewers, television,

mountains

Last week I may have been in the mountains, but this week back at work it has felt as if I was still climbing a few.

Monday was the inevitable email mountain, which took a few hours to clear down to the vital few. I also had the peak of a specific activity to scale, which I'd budgeted to take me most of the week. Inevitably another 'peak' appeared almost the moment I arrived in the office, and I'm only expecting to finish it by late Friday.

Then on Wednesday, another unexpected and urgent one appeared on the scene, so by Wednesday evening I had several work mountains ahead of me in the current range. Like in hill walking, you sometimes can't see the next hill ahead because the current one hides it.

Fortunately by today, Friday, I've managed to put down a couple of summit flags and have only one principle one left before I reach a level area.

So below is an 888 picture (8th August 08) reflective of my home working day.

salmon

Yesterday evening in a fish restaurant with friends catching up on news.

We'd picked a location which seemed highly logical at first and close to where we all used to hang out, because we all expected to be in the area.

In the end, all of us made lengthy special journeys because we'd all had changes to our agendas.

As a once closely knit group, we'd all spun off in different directions, so this was a good chance to bring our gossip up to date and compare notes. A sign of a good evening, the time whizzed past and I found myself getting home rather late.

gasoline

When we stayed in the lodge at the far end of the 100 kilometer dirt track, it was another twenty minute drive to the nearest gas station. I was advised to call ahead if I was making a trip, because they were not always open. So when I arrived alone in the population 43 town, I noticed the only gas station looking deserted. I drove to the pumps, which were chained and saw the note saying that the owner had needed to go out for a a couple of hours.

I checked the map, and the next town was only over the next mountain range and it also had a little 'S' on the map for services which in this case included fuel. So I headed off along another single track, which was also being repaired from the last rock slide.

Another twenty minutes and as I drove in, I was greeted by a large black and white sign saying "Thursday to Saturday". It was right by the second gas station. And it was Monday. This town looked even smaller than the last one and didn't seem to have any people in it at all. The map showed that this road didn't go any further. I wondered if the sign referred to the whole town.

I looked at the fuel gauge. "85 km to E" said the readout. I worked out the next big town with fuel was now around 120 kilometres away. Not enough fuel to make it. I'd have to go back to the last place and wait for the owner to return.

Somewhere along the journey I stuck my cellphone to the sun visor with Scotch tape to make the 90 second video above.

broken china?

A few days before the Olympics kick off and the UK press are now all in place around Beijing and we are beginning to see other stories reported.

The thought that Chinese people would seize the opportunity for peaceful protests to advance other freedom agendas seems to have been mainly quashed. The added special agents and special representatives are supposed to be already monitoring local people for any signs of political actions. If previous times are anything to go by, then suppressive action can be swift and violent.

It will be interesting to see how other world leaders really treat this. Some parts of China are now so intrinsic to the way that global economics operate (eg manufacture of electronics) that there is a delicate balance which could mean that some leaders choose to look the other way.

Sports bodies claim to make the events apolitical, but there's much to question in a society with such a poor human rights history and use of military pressure to quell dissidents. The Chinese version of the military intervention in Tianamen Square seems to have pretty much erased the whole event.

Quite some time ago I set up an experimental web cam feed from a Beijing hotel to rashbre central. It was supposed to be an inquisitive window into the city but then as a side effect exposed the fog levels. A few weeks ago it mysteriously stopped working and then a week or two later was replaced 'their end' with a link to a Chinese newspaper in English which extolls the positive virtues of the Games.

I still have the link working from an obscure page inside this blog and have noticed increased traffic to it over the last 3-4 weeks as increasing numbers of people are trying to get a glimpse of Beijing. For the whole of China I could only locate about a dozen webcams, so its probably not surprising that traffic levels increased. In its own small way it also illustrates the lock down of news flow from China.

Amnesty International has recently updated its assessment on China and still features key areas around the continuing use of the death penalty; abusive forms of administrative detention; the arbitrary detention, imprisonment, ill-treatment and harassment of human rights defenders, including journalists and lawyers; and the censorship of the internet. Needless to say, Amnesty's site is one of those that has been blocked despite the IOC saying originally that they would not accept Internet blocking during the Games.

Part of the point, I seem to remember, when China was awarded the Games, was to use the prestige and world focus to show positive progress in the way that China operates. Current signs are not very convincing.

no pressure

I managed to start Monday at a regular commuting time and this, coupled with sensible meal-times, seems to have reset my internal clock so I'm now back on London hours.

Monday's 45Mb of new messages comprised maybe 750 non junk-filtered messages with perhaps 10% requiring some form of action, often contained in 2 or 3 sentences. So overall the return to work has run fairly smoothly, without too much pressure.

Unlike the steam clock I spotted a few days ago.

waiting for the soul to catch up

Back to the commercial world later this morning.

Normally I'm good on de-jet-lagging, but this time I've returned but continued to have late nights sliding towards dawn, so I've probably stayed on Pacific time more than I intended.

Tonight's late 'spresso hasn't helped me regain a London state.

Its nearly one a.m. and feels like mid afternoon but I'd better get into the sleep zone or today will be really tough. I downloaded 45Mb of work emails earlier and assume I'll need a machete to hack through them.

Perhaps I should go for a bike ride.

No.

I should go to bed. Sweet dreams.

la poule au pot

By the time we'd finished waving to the pedalo and walking though Battersea Park, it was heading towards seven pm and we decided to move on towards a bite to eat. 'Lets go to somewhere in Pimlico' came the inspired suggestion - 'near to the Orange'.

So we zig-zagged our way from Battersea Bridge to the little square in Pimlico by Mozart's House and targeted the lovely French restaurant that sits on the corner with all the pretty pavement tables.

The signs, even at seven, were not good as there seemed to be large and small groups arriving with reservations from all directions. "Give me a minute", winked the maitre d', "Do you mind an outside table?". We smiled and a few minutes later were sitting in a prime spot outside watching the world go by. Then four hours of chatter blissed past us and as darkness descended the candle on our table started to have a purpose in the balmy evening. A lovely supper, great food, wine and company and then we all headed back towards a midnight Chelsea.

Rupert's Pedalo creates great mood in Pimlico

Time by the Thames today, supporting Rupert's pedalo marathon from Lechlade to London.

Rupert Young has been raising money for the Mood Foundation which he created as a charity reated to support for people with depressive conditions. Whilst the conditions do not discriminate, the recovery process can with treatments inaccessible and often only affordable to a few. Rupert admits there is no magic wand but wants Mood Foundation to help support people gaining access the appropriate services.

So why the pedalo? To raise profile via the 133 mile journey along the Thames, supported by Radio Stations, particularly Magic fm and various celebrity supporters such as Bear Grylls, Sebastian Faulks, Rachel Stevens, Amanda Lamb, Dermot O'Leary, Neil Fox and finally with Rupert's brother Will along with Karen Poole as they cross the finishing line at Chelsea/Grosvenor Bridge in Central London.

A bunch of us turned up to wave and cheer them across the finishing line on what was a sunny and hot afternoon, with the wind and tide generally operating in Rupert's favour. Let's hope the foundation can turn the tide for the people it intends to support.

Donation links are: rupert, sebastian faulks, will, devoted.

Technorati Tags: rashbre, pedalo, rupert, young, mood, foundation, london, thames,

avalanche

Just as an illustration of the interesting road conditions in some parts of Canada, I noticed this headline just before returning to the UK.

The avalanche is on a major route between Vancouver and Whistler and was one we'd travelled a few days earlier. Compared with the smaller roads where we'd seen minor rocks tumbling from the slopes onto the roads, this was a somewhat more spectacular incident taking out the main road and also the railway track.

Luckily we'd chosen the other rail direction from Vancouver and therefore missed this. The report estimates five days to restore the road and rail link. We've cut out the article and included it in our rather large amount of hand luggage along with the maple syrup.

goodbye to canada

Sitting in the hotel, pre departure to Calgary airport. Sipping a Margarita. Time to take one picture on the toysrus mini laptop 1.3 megapixel camera before dropping it into the backpack for the last time on this trip.

Amazingly, my attempt to blog whilst vacationing seems to have worked with only marginal techology glitches - mainly low speed links from places out in the wilds.

And the size and profile of the computer means it hasn't in any sense dominated the trip, with my notes being typed in a few chill-time minutes, or like now whilst sitting in a bar. The amusing point is that various people usually ask about the computer if they spot it, because of its small size. I'll admit I added an Apple sticker to the lid as well, but I don't think that really fools anyone.

Here in downtown Calgary there are about 10 wifi services in reach and the 'free' one that I'm using courtesy of the hotel.

Back to UK by Friday morning, highly refreshed.

timber moment

After the driving from East to West, the two day ride back to Calgary (maybe 1000 kilometers?) gave a different view of the landscape with many views of the mountains, lakes and forests. Naturally, with the emphasis on logging business in British Columbia, there was much evidence of logs being stored in the rivers, logs being transported and of course logs being made into timber planks.