Cloudy in Beijing Blogging about my time in China

Goddamn the Olympic Games

In the last post I said going to China at this stage of my life was perfect timing. That's not exactly true. Probably the opposite.

Back in the spring when I told everyone I was going to China, the automatic response was "Hey, maybe you can go see the Olympics." To me, the Olympics wasn't a big deal, and not in my reasons for going to the country. But "Hey, it could be cool," I naively thought.

I had originally wanted to come to China earlier in the year, like June, even May. But it wasn't until late August. The reason: The 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Yea, the mutherfuckin Olympics.

While hundreds of millions of Chinese celebrated the Olympics as a defining moment in China's stature among the world, I looked at it peevishly. Goddamn Olympics.

My plan for going to China was to become an English language teacher, like so many other expats have in the country. But blame for my timetable's delay was due to stricter regulations regarding visas. The Chinese government had clamped down on issuing them to ensure the Olympics would run smoothly. I was one of the casualties. In May I had accepted a teaching job, but the school was forced to rescind the offer. The government would not budge on its policies. In the next months I continued my search, the possibility of seeing the same outcome again, looming over my prospects of heading to China by this summer. It seemed like every other day I would half-jokingly shake my first at the mention of the Olympics.

Yea I was bitter. The months went on; June went, then July, and finally August came. My summer had lasted a bit too long, although that wasn't a bad thing either; I had never been more relaxed maybe in my entire life. Yet every day spent in my home in Oregon, felt like I was wasting a little bit of my life; idleness can be a killer. So I was eager to throw off my status as "in-between jobs", a descriptor that started to become a stain on my self-worth.

Finding the job wasn't the hard part. Despite having no teaching experience, and only an online degree (Yea, an online degree), I remember getting more than a dozen offers that summer. In July I had settled on a job in Xi'an, teaching college students. Finally in August I got the Visa papers. The government had cleared me. I could barely believe it.

In May when I first arrived home after leaving my job at the newspaper I remember telling my mom, almost angrily, "I will get to China by this summer." This was after she asked me "What if this doesn't work." Well, it almost didn't. I spent hours looking at teaching jobs everyday, trying to see if there was some way to work the system to get to China. In the end, it just felt like luck. And it probably was.

I came to China a day after the Olympics ended. Arriving at the Beijing Airport, I dragged my luggage to transfer planes after having endured at 14 hour long flight. Nevertheless, I was proud. Goddamn I was proud. "Yea China I did it. I'm here. I am finally here," I said to myself in a fatigued glee as I walked through the airport. I remember walking through a hallway and seeing all the signs and banners commerating the Olympics and the grand occasion it was. I smiled.

"Fuck you Olympics!" I pumped my first in the air. "I made it!"

Ironically, I do wish I could have gone to at least one Olympic event.