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11th December 2007

Fun facts about China and the Olympic games

- China sent its first Olympic athlete in 1932 to Los Angeles - Cheng Chun-liu. There was a bit of confusion as he just showed up at the Olympic village out of the blue and didn’t speak any English. Eventually with the help of interpreter he was able to convey that he was the sole representative for China. He ran in the 100 and 200 meter sprints and came last in both of his heats.

- Around 3500 babies in China have been given the name “Olympics” or Aoyuan as it is pronounced in Mandarin. Some Chinese mothers are trying to give birth on the day of the opening ceremony, August the 8th 2008. Eight is the luckiest number in Chinese culture. Wedding halls are also reportedly booked out on the day with couples who would prefer to tie the know than watch the opening ceremony.

- Chinese Olympic hurdler Liu Xiang’s legs have been insured for US$13.3.

- The Beijing Olympic mascot’s names are BeiBei, JingJing, HuanHuan, YingYing, NiNi and that order in short form they spell out BeiJing HuanYing Ni - welcome to Beijing.

- The most expensive item at the official Olympic merchandise store is priced at US$143,894.

- China won their first Winter Olympic gold medals in Salt Lake City.

- Gunners will be working with meteorologists to track and shoot rain clouds with rockets containing silver iodide, to ensure a rain free opening and closing ceremony at the games.

- According to Reuters, athletes, coaches, officials and journalists will consume around 75,000 litres of milk, 330 tons of fruit and vegetables and 750 litres of ketchup during the Olympics.

- $400 million will be spent on IT equipment and communications during the Beijing Olympic Games and will include 300 servers, 800 desktops and monitors and 70 notebooks. The laptops and desktops will be running Windows XP.

- Beijing National Stadium also known as the “birds nest” is believed to be the world’s largest enclosed space. The roof alone weighs 45,000 tonnes.

- China’s laborers working on the construction of the Olympic Game venues are paid around $7.69 a day, which is actually an increase of 30 to 100 percent. The increase was put in place from February 1st to meet the demand for labor on the construction of the new Olympic venues.

- China’s economy is referred to as “socialism with Chinese characteristics”. Whatever that means. China now has 106 US dollar billionaires, with more billionaires than any country other than the US

- The new National Swimming Center, dubbed the ice cube, was financed by overseas Chinese, including people from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. The total cost of the stadium is $100 million which $70 million of that was from donations.

- In July 2007, a fire broke out on the nearly-completed Peking University Gymnasium. The venue is to host the table tennis competition, but has since be repaired and is now in full operation.

- Chinese sport’s brand Li Ning was outbid by Adidas to sponsor the Chinese team. Li Ning then decided to clothe every presenter on China television’s CCTV5; the network that will broadcast the Summer Games across China. Li Ning’s logo also carries an uncanny resemblance to a famous US sports shoe company.

Li Ning Nike

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