Getting to the Olympic Village was an interesting trip. I was pretty braindead the day I had to leave, and really couldn't focus on packing. Avish picked me up around 11 and we went to LAX. Not really paying attention to anything (as per usual) we went to the Bradley International Terminal and got in line for China Airlines. Avish was holding a spot in the baggage check line while I was in the queue for ticketing and check in. A solid 20 minutes later I was at the front only to be informed that I was in the WRONG LINE. Apparently I had to go the Air China terminal located at #2, not at Bradley. China Airlines isn't the same as Air China...yikes. The difference (which my IR friends will understand) is that China Airlines flies to Taiwan ROC whereas Air China flies to China PRC. It makes me want to start an airline called India Airways to compete with Air India and fly only to Kashmir.
Dorky IR jokes aside, the plane ride was fairly uneventful. I met a real good guy from Hong Kong whose family was meeting him in Beijing to experience the Games. Frankly it felt like an Air India flight just with different food and movies. Note to both Air India and Air China: update your planes. Thankfully Air China's already on it having ordered a full fleet of brand-spankin-new DreamLiner Jets to be put into operation soon.
Twelve hours and no sleep later I was at Beijing Capital Airport (北京首都机场). If someone doesn't come out with an effective travel pillow soon I'm going to patent my own. Those U-shaped ones really don't work. Upon arriving to the airport I was utterly flabbergasted. The contrast between LAX and PKG is unreal. The Beijing Capital Airport was SO modern, and still smelled new too. And the air seemed quite comfortable...until I got outside. Then the humidity engulfed my every pore. I felt like I was being smothered by a warm, damp blanket. There was no avoiding perspiration. Even the windows on all the parked cars were saturated with water. Visibility was 500 meters ahead maximum. Driving towards the Olympic Village I didn't see anything but the greenery surrounding the highway (which was probably transplanted only for these Games) and maybe a few buildings.
Arriving to the village I was greeted by a whole throng of volunteers all sporting different colors depending on their responsibilities. They all seemed SO happy! They were probably all there prepared for the huge number of athletes that would arrive that day to the Village. Seeing as how it was 5 a.m. and I was alone I felt like somewhat of a celebrity with the amount of people who were just standing there waiting to help me with anything I needed. I wasn't allowed to carry my own suitcase. Trust me I tried. Not only did they put my ROLLER suitcase on a cart for me, they had one volunteer roll that cart to the bus.
I boarded the bus to my building in the village. Again alone. I honestly could've walked faster than that bus was traveling, but oh well, the guy seemed happy to help. He dropped me off to what seemed like the appropriate section, but apparently it wasn't. There was a crowd of rowers waiting to board the bus and the driver freaked. He ran to the next station to see if that's where I was supposed to be dropped, ran back, and started grabbing my suitcase to put it in the bus and take me, all the while eyeing the rowers to see if they were getting irritated with the delay. His stress made him look like he was going to have a heart attack. Thankfully my broken Mandarin helped me out here. I grabbed my suitcase and said “我可以走路， 没问题。" (Rough translation: I can walk from here, no problem.) Although he was a bit confused at my decision to walk, he eventually let me go seeing as how he had others to take care of on his bus route. Thankfully I saw Mr. Narayan, our Chef de Mission. He brought me up to my room. I'd probably have snaked around the village for another half hour in the fog/smog hoping to see an Indian flag if he didn't find me.
I set down my things, took a much-needed shower, brushed my teeth and headed for the dining hall. (Note to Galen Center management: MAKE YOUR FOOD LIKE THEY DO AT THE OLYMPICS! STOP BUTTERING AND GREASING EVERYTHING! IT'S NOT THAT HARD! Maybe we'd EAT there more often if you'd do it properly.) More to come on the Dining Hall later. For now, suffice it to say that everything there is quite good. Kicker and Peter I'm sorry you had such a crappy experience here, but it looks like they cleaned up their act since WUGs. Oh right, and the Halal food section tastes the best and is prepared with lots of care. No surprise there.
Again, volunteers galore to help people out. There was one volunteer who offered to walk me under her umbrella to the bus. While walking she asked me, “Is this your first time going to the National Aquatic Center?” I responded with a “对， 就是我的第一次。" She was a little taken aback and laughed, but told me my tonal pronunciation was really good. That's really good news. So we talked the rest of the way in Mandarin. Apparently she's a student at Beihai University. Nifty. You know what else was nifty? Her fanny pack. I'm so glad they're still in style somewhere in the world. I swear 1 in 5 volunteers is sporting one here. They're so convenient, even if I'd never be caught dead in one. Speaking of Bejing universities, my USC friend Katherine Chu invited me to watch an outlawed film this summer in her class about one. It's called “Summer Palace.” (Yihe Yuan) It's one worth watching. Much of the message in that film covers the internal drama that so many college students experience.
Oh hey Tamas. I got on the bus to the National Aquatic Center and was happy to see Tamas make his way over to the bus as well. It's always good to find friends and teammates to talk to when I'm delirious. We talked about the usual things, poked the bubbles that make up the outside of the NAC, and then swam. The water in the NAC pool is CRYSTAL CLEAR. I mean, it's SO clear that when I dive in I feel uneasy in the pit of my stomach because I feel like I'm suspended in midair rather than floating in water. I wish I had an underwater camera to show everyone this – you can see perfectly from one end to the other and the lights from the ceiling glisten on the fresh, polished tiles at the bottom of the pool.
For some reason the NAC competition pool really reminds me of some sort of hybrid between the Asian Games pool in Doha and the Indianapolis IUPUI pool. One thing's for sure, it's very different from the setup in both Melbourne Rod Laver Arena '07 or Omaha's Qwest Center for US Trials '08 probably because it is a permanent pool rather than a temporary one. There are 16,000 available seats at the National Aquatic Center; that's far too few for a sport that's growing in popularity so rapidly. To put things in perspective, there were about 13,000+ people at the Qwest Center for finals every night at the US Trials alone. It was a breeze getting tickets for US Trials despite the huge turnout and is damn near impossible to find two tickets for my mom and sister to see me swim in Beijing. 
Today's workout:
4x3x2 Warm-up
1203829x50m slow swimming and drills trying to wake my body up
3x50m on 2:00 sprint at 100 pace
400m Cool down
Tension cords dryland routine. 3X8 pulls for lats, biceps, triceps, chest.
Core work – Suitcase crunch, fupas (Hey Kipp what's a fupa?), and Russian twists.
I felt like googly noodles in the water, unable to really swim properly or grab any water. I cut myself some slack and just got out since it was my first day in the pool after traveling. Part of me was really worried that I was getting “soft” and wasn't in shape to race at the Games. The other part said to just relax, I've put in a solid year of training already.
Came back, got myself some dinner, walked back to my apartment through the violent rainstorm that happened at night, dried off...wait...WHY is my towel turning brown? I ran it across my skin once more...yep, it turned brown. So it could be one of two things: either the rain was so hard it was washing off my skin pigment or the air outside was really dirty. I'm gonna have to go with the second one. So instead of jumping straight into bed, I took a good shower first, lest I brown my bedsheets too. Goodnight y'all.
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