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Well, it's finally here. And I don't know about the rest of the world, but over here this day has been about as hyped up as new millennium eve was. Jeez, was that really 8 years ago?

Security is ridiculously tight, we're being scanned and searched what seems like every 5 minutes, and most of Beijing is cordoned off, including Tiananmen Square and the Olympic arena (of course). Everyone is frantically trying to organize where they'll be at 8:08pm when the opening ceremony commences and the fireworks are set off, and people are speculating as to who will light the Olympic torch. There is endless gossiping about who managed to get tickets to the opening ceremony (practically nobody!), and slagging off those who managed to get a ticket at all (I did! Cycling in the Vendome, next weekend. Ahem.)

This really is China's big chance to show the world how great it is. And man, are they going for it. Yesterday I walked passed a street of Chinese people chanting "Come on China! Come on China!" for no particular reason. And I'm feeling quite left out that I haven't yet purchased my 'I heart China' t-shirt, since everybody else seems to have one and wear it religiously everyday. I do, however, have a Beijing 2008 sweatshirt, but if I wore that in this humidity, I'd probably die.

Expats in Beijing, I've found, are not getting as excited about the Olympics as the locals. In fact I was chatting to two Americans earlier that were saying how they hoped that things didn't go so perfect for China during the Games. One guy, having lived in China for more than three years, was quite bitter that Beijing had put on a big front, cleaning up the streets, planting flowers and reducing traffic. He said that the people that come during this time won't be met by the real China, just a pretty version of it. But hey, you can't blame a country for making an effort, can you? It's no different to you picking up your dirty undies off the floor and washing the dishes when you have a friend coming to visit.

I, on the other hand, have been dragged along with the hype, and will probably be the one that starts a "You can do it, China!" chant tonight after a few mojitos. However, my one little nitpick is that I seriously think that whoever coined the Beijing Olympics as the "Coming Out Party", should have reconsidered it before opening their mouth. To me, and maybe I stand alone on this one, it connotes that this is the day Beijing announces to the world that it thinks Judy Garland was "fabulous" and is in a serious relationship with a guy called Guo Dong.

Having just let an opening ceremony ticket slip through my fingers (my friend called me to offer me a ticket, but I was at work and missed the call. Doh!), today all comes down to organizing this evening. I'm sure a majority of Beijing will agree with me when I say that the best thing about this day is that we all got a day off work. London take note of that one. Going to stand outside the birds nest at any point today is no-no. I predict that there will be approximately 3.2 squillion people standing outside there tonight, all getting pushy and sweaty and screaming "One World, One Dream!" at the top of their lungs, whilst waving tiny China flags.

I've read that the opening ceremony is set to be the most lavish in history, the "greatest show on Earth." Damn, I still can't quite believe I missed out on that ticket..*curses*

Everybody is asking "what is with the weather?!" We somehow managed to survive July without committing suicide, after it practically rained every day. We were told that it was all so that the sky would be clear for the Olympics. Now, I don't know exactly how you make it rain, but some scientist people in the south of China have been, well, doing it. Is that even legal? Will I get extradited for telling you this?? I had better stop writing now.

Happy Olympics opening day, everybody!

Last weekend I was lucky enough to have an excuse to stay at Urban Splash's (responsible for the Rotunda update) recently redeveloped and re-opened Midland Hotel in Morecambe. The Art Deco seaside retreat got a huge amount of publicity on reopening, Guardian features, Culture Show specials, asking the question of whether the redevelopment of the hotel could spark a renaissance for the whole town.

It is stunningly beautiful at first glance, although the view is spoilt by the car park packed with monster trucks that I'm sure Mrs Simpson (of Edward and... fame) didn't have to put up with. The rooms are also fantastic, and a great deal of time and effort has been spent reflecting the style of the building through nice bits of design. A particular favourite touch of mine was the beer mats in the style of the Marion Dorn rugs that once graced the reception. The spiral staircase just begs you to take photos of it, which I did:

But there's something a bit wrong. There are already stains and signs of rust on the roof of the rear terrace, there is the odd bit where the floor titles have worked loosed are in need of repair. Some of the doors are marked with signs obviously made with Microsoft Publisher, blu-tac'd on, saying "staff only". The way to the toilet from the function suite is past a pile of mops and buckets, primed for use with already dirty water in them. Not huge problems, and ones I'd have probably not even noticed if it were not for the 1920s decadent vibe I was trying to buy into.

You may think that living in dusty old Beijing in the Summer time would be a bit of a drag, but you would be wrong. The list of things to do is endless.
With barbecues, themed parties and water parks, at times it's like being on holiday in Majorca, but with far less stag/hen holidays and vomiting, of course.

When the weather is hot and sweltering and you are beginning to feel like a bag of boil-in-the-bag mifan (rice), the one place you long to be is on the beach, with soft sand between your toes, some cool water (not the Davidoff fragrance) to dip your steaming hot bod into, and some relaxing tropical 'holiday' music playing subtly in the background from the beach cocktail bar (Bob Marley or UB40 are always winners).

Well, who'd have thought it, but I've found just the place in this bustling capital city.
Hallelujah! An arguably beautiful man-made beach is just the ticket for an expatriate who wants to fry in the midday sun. So long as you don't mind Chinese people taking photographs of you as you lie on the beach in your bikini, that is. Many Chinese women opt for beachwear like those luminous leotards that GMTV's Mr. Motivator used to wear.

Don't misunderstand me, I don't run in slow motion across the beach, ala Baywatch, topless and wearing a red thong that just screams "notice me". I should imagine I would be arrested for such an act. No, I just wear what any other western female would select: An average black bikini. Yet still, expect photos to be taken. It becomes a way of life. I'm getting a taste of what it would be like to be Princess Di. Albeit on a much much much smaller scale, I grant you. But whereas before I would tut at celebrities who would attack the paparazzi, and be shown photographed in The Sun giving the finger (not the Cadbury's chocolate one), but now I empathize with them. I'm laughing at myself as I write this. How pretentious I must sound? But seriously, despite the colossal amount of expats living in Beijing today, we still get stared at and get 'papped'. However, no amount of 'papping' of me in my bikini is going to make me wear one of Mr. Motivator's cast-offs.

I'm hoping that my saviour is going to be the Olympic Games. After a month of foreigner overload, and after taking as many photographs as their phones, cameras and computers will hold, I'll be able to run down the street naked without so much as a click. Well, that's my theory anyway. Something I devised from the Clockwork Orange technique: Give the person an overload of something they like and they wont like it any longer. I'll let you know how that one works out.

If you do plan on coming to Beijing to watch the games, have your wallet ready, because I read in the China Daily yesterday that they're expecting foreigner visitors to spend $400m. Crikey, now that's a lot of noodles.

From an outside-of-a-relationship perspective, I have always advised my friends never to change for a man. Be who you are. And if he doesn't appreciate you as you are, then get rid and move onto the next. Being the supportive best friend, and the much hated girlfriend's best friend, has been a role that I feel I have excelled in. It's so much easier to be objective when you are not involved in a relationship yourself.
However, when you are the one involved in a relationship, the objective way of thinking becomes somewhat hazy, and you'll find that no matter how much your best friend demonises your boyfriend for making you want to listen to a different kind of music, this is just something that you find you want to do. It's about keeping your lover interested, finding a common ground, and adapting to maintain attraction.

When the relationship ends, perhaps you will find that it has changed you. Maybe you continue to listen to that new music and do those new things. The relationship has broadened your mind, and taught you something new. You live and you learn. The biggest lesson of all usually being, don't date someone like that again.

If Beijing were a person, like you and I, I would say that Beijing has been looking for some love interest for quite a while now. Beijing's not unattractive, in fact rather beautiful. It has a reputation, sure, but name one place or someone that doesn't...

After a long time 'developing' and doing it's own thing, Beijing now finds that it will finally be in for some romance this Summer. Summer lovin', if you please. In fact, this Summer will be like Beijing appearing on Chris Tarrant's Man-O-Man, as the only bear-chested contestant in front of an audience of over-sexed middle-aged women. The world's eyes, and not just those belonging to females, will be trained on Beijing for a whole four weeks while it hosts the 2008 Olympic Games.
In preparation for it's 'close-up', Beijing has already begun to change it's appearance. Obviously it wants to look it's best for this date.
So, it's cutting down on it's smoking habit. No more smoking in restaurants and taxi's, for this city, which is an achievement in itself. It has also noticed that it's a bit smelly, and err toxic, so it has cut down traffic pollution by alternating the days for which people can use their vehicles. And to show that it is the caring and environmentally aware type, it has placed charges on plastic carrier bags, in the hope that people will use less, and recycle more.
Commited, check. Hygenic, check. Caring of mother Earth, check.
Add a little bit of 'wow' factor by throwing in a few impressively big and odd-shaped buildings, and bingo. It's innovative and good-looking. Beijing could be the perfect man-o-man.

Now whereas I have always (hypocritically) advised my friends to never change for a man, a man changing for a woman seems...ok. I'm no Germaine Greer, but I do think that if there's something annoying about your man you could try your luck and ask him to quit it. I'm not talking about drastic things, like encouraging your lover to have liposuction or abandon his family... Really! But perhaps a well-timed hint that the moustache that he's trying, and failing terribly, to grow, makes him look like a reject from the village people. Or that when he chews his food with his mouth open it you feel an uncontrollable urge to spear him with your fork/chopstick. Not that I condone violence in a relationship. Or any place, for that matter.

Of course if changes are made, you need to know that they're going to be taken seriously. If I promise to not sing in the mornings, then he must promise to never expose his feet until they have been thoroughly bathed in dettol. And we should accept these little 'nit-picks' as friendly advice from a loved one that they are incredibly annoying and unattractive. We should be thankful that they have pointed out these things, because it means that by stopping you from doing this they have improved you as a person.

What makes Beijing the equivalent of the perfect man, is that it has made a commitment to stop all of these unattractive things, and prove to the world that it is wonderfully caring, hygenic, modern, multicultural and innovative, and not the slob that people have always assumed.

Ergo I find that I like my cities like I like my men. Willing to change and ambitious. Not to mention, big and rich.

What's you relationship with Shank's pony? It's the only sensible way to get round major cities, I reckon. Public transport and your legs beat the car hands down, particularly in London.

So how far do you want to amble to find a metropolitan attraction? Half a mile (that's 0.6km) is a doddle I reckon. A mile (1.6km) is easy. A mile and a half (2.4km) is a piece of cake.

Well, book in at The Quality Hotel, Westminster, and you'd do the half mile to reach King's Road, Sloane Square or Westminster Cathedral on foot. Within a mile are Big Ben, also that MP place that gave HP sauce the logo on its bottles, Knightsbridge, the London Eye, Mayfair, St James and more.

Buses aren't the most romantic form of transport, or at least aren't romanticised. Car driving gets the Route 66 treatment, the concept of "the road movie" and any number of soft rock classics, trains get Brief Encounter, Night Mail and er, Jimmy Saville. Ask anyone to name a piece of culture about a bus -- Summer Holiday and funny looks are all you'll get.

I think it's something to do with the bus being the middle ground, not the romantic freedom of the car, nor the regimented closeness of the long distance train. Buses are always just that one step up from Shank's pony, and bus stops don't get names so there's isn't even a Mornington Crescent type game to play.

We didn't have a car when I was a kid, and for one reason or another I'm just not bothered by them, trains were always expensive (they were competing with the fabled 2p fares on the bus, remember) and still to me seem a middle class way of travelling I'm not totally comfortable with. So buses are where it's at for me culturally, not that I get aroused by a shapely MCW Metrobus or even a Gardner engined Daimler Fleetline (I am however quietly obsessed with the 11 route, the local network in general and harbour fine memories of the tracline 65).

The interweb, of course, is nothing if not home to the nichest of niche content so, along with the bus-spotting and the tiny sites I've made that track people using twitter on the bus, there is something genuinely interesting and bus-related happening.

Dear oh dear, poor Sharon Stone must be kicking herself. Correction, Sharon Stone's publicist must be kicking her, as this week she spectacularly put her foot in it by alienating the third largest country in the world. Dear oh dear indeed.

At the Cannes Film Festival, the usual press surrounded the stars to get a few quotes to fill their column inches. Imagine the scene as the journalists asked Stone the standard questions... "How did you like working with (insert name of director/actor)?", "Tell us about your new film...", etc etc. Then one cocky journalist decides to try his/her luck and ask her to comment on the (very touchy) topic of the situation between China and Tibet. There are a few sniggers from the other journos in the crowd; of course she's not going to comment on that! Celebrities can rarely get away with having a public opinion when it comes to politics. Unless it's written into a song, ala Bono, Lennon, Dylan. A catchy melody tends to filter a bit of tension between insults, we've discovered.
Unfortunately, Stone didn't have a catchy melody, or a thought for her flailing career when she let rip, "I'm not happy about the way the Chinese are treating the Tibetans". Well, not many people are, Shaz. Surely, she must have some great intellectual follow up to such an over-opinionated remark.. "(...) because I don't think anyone should be unkind to anyone else." Oh I see. Well that's a good enough reason then... Isn't it?

She could have left it at that, and perhaps got away with losing a few Chinese fans, but she went on to add that she reckons that because China were mean to Tibet, the Sichuan earthquake happened. Ouch. So Stoney turns out to be a big believer in karma - the Hindu and Buddhist belief of cause and effect. It's no big deal. If we can accept that Tom Cruise believes we're all aliens, and Michael Jackson believes he's Peter Pan, we can come to terms with Sharon Stone believing in karma. In fact, I'm actually a believer in karma myself, but only really to the point of if I'm rude to my mum then I'll break a fingernail. If I did have strong opinions about more pressing matters, such as the reason why my mate's husband left her must be because she dropped his toothbrush down the toilet and didn't tell him, I'd have the sense not to blab about it. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that people don't like blabbers. Blabbing is bad.

I think that Sharon Stone blabbed a bit too much that day. And her karmic retribution is that she'll be lucky if any film featuring her will be shown in China and Hong Kong for a while, and her advertising campaigns for names such as Christian Dior have all been removed from stores and billboards. There is now a call for a boycott of other products with which Stone is said to be associated, such as Guerlain and Ebel. Phew-wee, now that's some bad karma. She must've dropped a whole lot of toothbrushes down the toilet, as well as insulted *1321851888 people.

For future reference, we can make the assumption that blabbing equals bad karma, kids.

*Population of China 2007, courtesy of wiki.answers.com
Quotes courtesy of Beijing Today 30/05/08 p.5

Ask a Chinese person what their opinions are of Englishmen and a majority will sigh (women only, usually) and confidently reply, "Englishmen are gentlemen."

How embarrassing for me when I have to correct them and say, "well, actually....not anymore.."
Sometimes I just don't say anything. I just smile and raise my eyebrows.

Exactly how out of date are these perceptions that China has about England? Are we talking Austen era? Shakespearean times? Because I can't remember the last time I thought to myself, "that man was so chivalrous when he chose to spit into the bush and not onto my walk way".

Having said that, I've been away from home for a long time, and have somehow also begun to believe that English men are all floppy haired and bumblingly apologetic, in a Hugh Grant-esqe way.

Very rarely will a Chinese man hold open the door for you, offer you his jacket, or allow you exit the elevator first. Out here, it's every man for himself. I cuss under my breath, as I convince myself "this would never happen in England".

Perhaps I've been in China far too long. You could live in paradise and begin to get narky at something or other. The stupid weather is too hot on my perfect caribbean island. Those flippin' angels are playing those harps again, don't they ever give it a rest?! It's completely true that we're never happy with our lot.

When I'm in a bad mood, I become Miss Patriot 2008, I don't wear a sash or tiara or anything, but I do convince myself that the food, weather, people, and even the traffic are so much better in England than anywhere else. Much alike when we have a bad day in England, we consider emigrating.

I secretly console my bad moods with my 'Pride and Prejudice' ideal of England and English people, that could only have been created through a detachment from home.

Man, am I in for a shock when I return home...

The news reports on the television and the headlines on the internet are stupefying.

Given that the country that this almighty tremor happened in is where I am right at this moment.

Being English, I am used to watching these terrific natural disasters on the television as I sip my tea and shake my head in dumbfoundness. It seems like a different world as I sit in my cosy cocoon of western safety.

I love my Chinese students. And while it's a pain preparing lessons and having to wake up sleeping students in the back row every five minutes, it's always worth it to hear the little improvements, and their their logical method to approaching such an illogical language as English.

Last year I taught cabin attendants; classes of 40 impossibly beautiful Chinese girls and boys who were all far more interested in what I was wearing more than their English textbooks. They would spend our classes flicking through magazines and giggling behind their hands, taking photographs of themselves on their mobile phones using the standard pouting, wide-eyed pose, or giving the peace sign. The effort these girls went to to make themselves appear cute and child-like would irritate me at times. They were young ladies of 20 and 21, and yet they drank their tea out of baby bottles, sucked on dummies and spoke in sickly sweet childlike voices that would make Michael Jackson cringe. Predictably, though ever so disturbingly, the boys found it adorable.

In the same school I also taught the air mechanics classes. Most of these students were the boyfriends of the cabin attendants, or harbouring a massive crush on a cabin attendant. I loved these students, even more so when they weren't spitting out of the windows. These boys were amusing and straightforward with me, and so I tried my best to reciprocate. For instance, they all had ridiculous English names, like Adidas, Hitler, Rain and Kobe. So when two boys decided to call themselves Shirley and Mavis, I told them that they had old lady names and that perhaps they would like to change. They said "no thank you". Right-o then!

I swiftly became fascinated by stereotypes after moving to China and learning that not all Chinese people are really short, ride bicycles and do kung fu. So I am always curious to know what preconceptions my students have about English people. My class of air mechanics were the perfect candidates to tell me it like it is. The answers I got were..."Englishmen are gentlemen. They carry umbrellas everywhere they go." "English people live for football." "English people have big noses and red faces.." Maybe that's just me..? "English women are very ... open and drink too much". Most definitely not me... Ahem.

This year, having moved to Beijing, I was disappointed to hear that my students would be Doctors and Pilots. I expected them to be uber serious and boring, so no fun for me. Yet I've found quite the opposite. The doctors, for instance, are all old enough to be my parents, but instead of this being a bad thing, it means that I can have grown up conversations with them! We have debates, I teach them English cursing, and their eagerness to learn means that I can hold more in-depth and intellectual conversations with them than I can confess to having had with some native English speakers.

I figure that your early twenty's is a period of major transition. This is the changeover from child to adult. As a 25-year old, I simply can't hold a conversation with a 20 year old. We have nothing in common. Put me in a room with a 20-year-old of any nationality, and I guarantee there will be nothing but space between us.

From my experience, a Chinese 20 and 21 year old is significantly more naïve in comparison to Western young adults. As the average English 20 year old might be contemplating which dummy to buy their toddler, the Chinese 20 year old is wondering which dummy to accessorise with their pink hair ribbons. If you were to ask my opinion, I would have to say that teaching 20 year olds is very similar to teaching children, albeit considerably less endearing.

Despite my impatience with child-like 20 year olds, I am actually super-great with children. So much so that I have a part-time job tutoring two 11-year-old girls. Their English names are May and Lisa, and they are without doubt the highlight of my week. They make me laugh more in 2 hours of tutoring more than I do in a weeks worth of lessons and playtime. Their English is at a high enough standard for us to have semi-serious conversations. 'Semi-serious' because their facial expressions and the way they act out their conversations would put Lee Evans and Jim Carrey out of work. Last week I taught them the names of different kinds of sports, which they had to act out when I called out. My all time favourites being synchronised swimming and weight lifting. (Try and imagine their facial expressions please!) As people get older, they really do get less and less amusing.

So for a teacher who never wanted to be and still doesn't plan on being a teacher, I do so love teaching. I should imagine that teaching English students would be considerably less amusing. Especially seeing as teachers in the UK are never likely to be faced with the question "why don't we call toes, 'foot fingers'?"
It's a question that's still got me head scratching...