London bus drivers are being asked to sign up for a three-month journey from Trafalgar Square to Beijing. In a scheme to celebrate cultural links between this year’s Olympic Games host city and London, host to the Games in 2012, an iconic red double-decker bus will set off on a three-month journey.

Leaving in June, the bus is expected to arrive in Beijing before the Olympic flag is handed over to London Mayor Ken Livingstone at the closing ceremony.

Eight drivers from London’s various bus operators are needed to make the trip which will cross Europe, Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan before reaching China.

Not to rain on anyone’s parade but as London buses appear to have the greatest difficulty finding their way from Clapham to Balham — a distance of a few miles — this may be the journey too far.
Source: Shanghai Daily

The Olympics has caused the first mobile paper to be launched in China. Zhu Ling, Editor-in-Chief of China Daily, and Wang Jianzhou, Chairman of China Mobile (seen in our illustration) together launched China’s first English-Chinese mobile paper at a ceremony and press conference held in Beijing.

Jointly produced by China Daily and China Mobile, China Daily Mobile News sends English-Chinese news to users’ cell phones as multimedia messages through wireless technology.

China Daily Mobile News will allow visitors to experience China’s internationalization, technological advancements and improved English communication standards.

The China Daily newspaper group has a professional team of English-speaking staff reporters, correspondents, editors and foreign experts. And China Daily Mobile News presents the media information to users in English and Chinese.

Users of China Mobile Go Tone and M-Zone can subscribe by sending the message ‘CD’to 10658000 for RMB5 a month.

China Daily Mobile News will be sent to users twice a day, one in the morning and the other in the evening. Each multimedia package contains 10 to 20 pieces of news.
Source: China Daily

The Beijing Olympics may be a time to slow down smoking, a habit that kills about a million people in China every year.

China has about 360 million smokers, which is 26% of its population and a third of the global total. Financially the nation is partially dependent on the tobacco industry for huge tax revenues.

It is not considered socially unacceptable to smoke. Even top Chinese athletes such as Liu Xiang, world and Olympic champion in the 110m high hurdles, advertises for Chinese tobacco company Baishan, while some football and basketball professionals still enjoy a smoke at half-time.

In most other countries of the world smoking is realized to be pretty evil and is banned most places. Possibly the tobacco companies have though they could outsource smoking to China. This may be changing.

Communications expert Ren Mengshan is openly advocating the Olympics as ‘a good platform for the government to promote non-smoking and the benefits of good health.’
Besides declaring the Beijing Olympics ’smoke-free,’ organizers have also banned tobacco from public places where athletes and Olympic officials are likely to meet.

The capital has further mandated that 70% of all hotel rooms be non-smoking and since October last year, has banned taxi drivers from smoking in their cars.

In addition to its recent efforts, since 1996 Beijing authorities have tried to ban smoking in public places such as restaurants, schools, hospitals, train and bus stations, libraries and museums.

Although their efforts have met with little success, there are glimmers of hope.

Beijing’s first non-smoking eatery, the Meizhou Dongpo, opened in the capital in October last year. Tables in the Sichuan-style eatery are decorated with signs that read ‘no-smoking restaurant, a forest in the middle of the city.’
Source: Times of India

During the Olympics what you most earnestly desire, what you pray for, is to avoid a terrorist incident. Much work goes on behind the scenes to prevent this.

Now Beijing’s international airport is installing high-tech portable bomb detectors as part of its security plan to combat terrorism ahead of the Summer Olympics.

Zhang Zhi, deputy director general of the airport police, said the new detectors will be able to warn of explosives in a few seconds.

He said airport police have already been equipped with X-ray machines, anti-riot robots, and some bomb detection and disposal devices — ‘But we need more and faster bomb detectors for the Games.’

Zhang Zhi said other measures will include setting up a security zone to prevent anyone from taking shots at aircraft as they take off and land. Traffic checkpoints will be set up around the airport. In addition, background checks are being conducted on all airport employees.

China believes terrorism is the biggest threat facing this summer’s Olympic Games and has called for closer international cooperation to prevent possible attacks.

China’s generally secretive police agencies have sought advice on Olympic security from the U.S., Germany, Israel and other foreign governments.

FBI head Robert Mueller said during a visit earlier this year that China’s security preparations for the Olympics were impressive and that his agency was lending its expertise on fending off possible terrorist attacks.
Source: AP

Fu Ying, the Chinese ambassador to the United Kingdom and double Olympic champion Kelly Holmes will be among the 80 torchbearers carrying the Olympic Flame across London on its way to Beijing on April 6.

Broadcaster Sir Trevor McDonald and actress Amara Karan will also run the one-day leg, as part of the worldwide Beijing Olympic Torch Relay.

Fu Ying said that she was glad to be involved in the event, starting at Wembley Stadium, site of the 1948 Olympic Games, and finishing at the O2 Arena at North Greenwich, which is to be one of the venues for the 2012 Games.

Large crowds are expected as the Olympic torch is carried through ten London boroughs.

The Mayor of London Ken Livingstone, said, ‘Following the outstanding success of the Athens Olympic Torch Relay in London in 2004. It is a great honor for our city to participate in the Beijing 2008 Olympic Torch Relay and once again carry the Olympic spirit of friendship and cooperation between nations across the world.’

It also allows him to get some publicity for the 2012 games which will be held in London.

The Olympic Flame will go to 19 cities on five continents before returning to China and arriving in Beijing for the start of the 2008 Olympic Games on August 8.
Source: China Daily