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O
Boy the Olympics
By
John Overington
Ancient
and recent history shows that holding the Olympic Games in your country
is a
momentous event, one that is earned only by the most modernized
states. Greece
was the epicenter of the ancient world, and the Olympics were held
there. By the turn of the 20th century, when the Olympic
Games were revived they were held in the Western Hemisphere,
which was then the economic and social center of the planet. More
recently, Japan
had its coming out party with the opening of the bullet train and the
Olympics
there in the 1960s. Now, in 2006, the
Chinese government and people are preparing for their coming out.
China
has began its course toward more open markets, and as a result, has
made a name
for itself on the world stage. The top
hat to this ensemble is the 2008 Olympics in their capital city of Beijing.
These Olympic Games are very
relevant to our
over arching discussion of transnationalism versus vernacular
urbanism because it highlights the Chinese government's decision to
move toward
the
former. By throwing their name into the
hat for the games, and then completely rebuilding the city of Beijing,
the Chinese government has chosen transnationalism for its people,
regardless
of any other sentiment. A very sad and often
over looked
aspect of the new building that is a result of the Olympics in 2008 is
the
massive displacement of communities from areas where new massive
stadiums are
being built. Much like the situation
described by Eric Darton in the article “The Janus Face of
Architectural
Terrorism,” the communities that live in the areas that will be soon
built on
for the Olympics are being displaced to new homes.
Like communities that were moved from their
homes and businesses in New York City
before the construction of the World Trade Centers, the Chinese
communities of Beijing
are being subjected to overpowering governments forcing them from their
livelihoods and homes. The Chinese
communities are being ripped from what they know as familiar for many
of the
same reasons that the maritime community that had been in lower Manhattan
for 300 years were displaced before the building of the World
Trade Center in
New York.
I
was able to spend just over forty hours in Beijing,
but every one of those forty hours had huge evidence of construction
and
progress toward transnational and away from the vernacular that makes
up the
1.3 billion Chinese people. The second we
got into our bus from the airport to our hotel an hour away, we were
affected by the reconstruction of Beijing
that is a result of the games coming to the city, and all the crowds
that accompany them, in two years. We
had to take an alternate route to our hotel, by passing
the highway
to smaller, more local roads. The
highway is being rebuilt better night by night, while traffic is sent
to other
roads that are also being worked on! The
fact that both the road I should be on is being fixed, and the
alternative
route that I am traveling is being repaired as well is a good indicator
of the
massive improvements planned by the city. Once
into Beijing,
the sites
were about the same, construction galore.
The National History
Museum
had a huge digital clock counting down the seconds until the games
begin, some
686 days away. The Forbidden
City was only partially accessible because the government
had
decided to repair and clean every building in the complex.
I was only able to see a photo of the large
throne room that was printed on the tarp that covered the original, due
to the
massive construction. At night along the
main pub street, I stumbled through pavement, gravel, and dirt roads,
all being
changed for the massive numbers of visitors expected in 2008.
All of these
different sites point to an overwhelming change in direction for the
aesthetics
of the city, which tramples on the vernacular of Beijing. The quaint local shops and markets are turned
into tourist traps for the gain of the new more open government. The Chinese want to break our in a big way in
2008 when the spotlight will be on their city. Is
the only way that the Chinese will be able to make this huge splash at
the expense of the local culture that is being forced out of their
otherwise unchanged lives?
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