A friend dropped off a bag of magazines while we were in the US and as I was flipping through one of them....an article jumped off the page. The magazine is the April 2008 issue of InStyle. I don't mind the "older" issue because English magazines are a luxury here costing $10-$12 dollars per magazine. Anyway....the article says....This year's hottest travel destination.....China!!! Today I am wondering if they mean hot as in temperature or hot as in "cool factor". The humidity is so heavy I think I can see it in the air. Back to the article....it says "China is embracing capitalism with enthusiasm and nowhere is this more evident than in its two major cities: Shanghai, the glossy city by the sea, and Beijing, the sophisticated capital turned Olympic venue." Now.....I happen to know a great little Bed and Breakfast place in one of these great cities overlooking the Huangpu river.....so......if you want to visit this year's "hottest" destination....come on over!!!! I would suggest waiting for a month or so however unless you really want "hot!".

The Olympics are just around the corner.....in fact the opening ceremony is in four days. 08-08-08 at 8:00pm. Eight is a very lucky number in China....thus the chosen date and time for the opening.

We will be going to Beijing on Friday to see some of the sporting events. The first round of tickets were given out through a lottery system and we qualified for this lottery because we have Chinese residents visas. Although we did not get any of our first choice picks....we did get a good variety of events. We have volleyball, fencing, diving, basketball, and tennis. We also have tickets to three football (soccer) matches that are being played in Shanghai. The opening ceremony tickets were given out one by one...ie...each of us had to apply separately for one ticket. We did not get any of the opening ceremony tickets....Tucker looked up the price of tickets a few weeks ago...the cheapest was $2000 and the most expensive was $20,000.......so......we will be watching it from our hotel room in Beijing.

The USA Olympic basketball team is in Shanghai and they are playing an exhibition game tomorrow night......so.....we are going to watch that as well. There is Olympic excitement in the air here as this is a really really really big deal for China.

Good news....the Shanghai Daily reported yesterday that China will open more websites during the Olympics so the games can be reported without censorship! That is a huge step for China.