Incredible photos of China as it prepares for the 2008 Olympics

From Boston.com…
(All photos by AFP/Reuters/AP… 24 photos in total, definitely worth a closer look)

How the East was won: China wins battle against algae… for now.

By Quentin Sommerville
From the BBC…

The Chinese government has successfully cleared tonnes of algae that was blocking the Olympic sailing course in the eastern city of Qingdao.

A special protection zone was set up using a boom and netting.

But in other areas the thick bright green algae is still polluting the beaches.

The Chinese government had set a goal of clearing the sailing area by Tuesday. The Olympic Games begin on 8 August.

The water at the Olympic sailing course in Qingdao is now largely algae free.

Some 10,000 troops from the People’s Liberation Army have lifted over half a million tonnes of the thick heavy weed from the coastline.

A boom and netting is stopping more of the algae coming ashore.

Olympic sailing teams here say they can now train and will be able to compete in Qingdao’s waters.

But at beaches not protected by the boom, the algae is still coming in.

China says it is a naturally occurring, though rare, phenomenon. Environmentalists blame pollution.

How many signs do we need to realize that Beijing is gonna screw up the Olympics?

By John Yardley
IHT.com
June 30, 2008
Click here for the original article

With less than six weeks before it plays host to the Olympic sailing regatta, the city of Qingdao has mobilized thousands of people and an armada of small boats to clean up an algae bloom that is choking large stretches of the coastline and threatening to impede the Olympic competition.

Local officials have initiated an all-out effort to clean up the algae by mid-July. Media reports estimate that as many as 20,000 people have either volunteered or been ordered to participate in the operation, while 1,000 boats are scooping algae out of the Yellow Sea. The official news agency, Xinhua, reported that algae currently covered a third of the coastal waters designated for the Olympic races…

Click here for the full story

New 2008 Olympics Commercial About Derek Redmond.. Best Commercial Ever.

This is quite possibly the best Olympic commercial I have ever seen– and narrated by Morgan Freeman? Come on!! SO GOOD… Sorry the video’s not very good quality, you can visit the Visa website and watch it there in good quality but they don’t let you embed it.

Here’s a 3 minute documentary about the incident, produced by BBC Sports:

Click here to see Derek Redmond’s Wikipedia article