Of Fuwas and Machine Guns

As Yang packs her bag thinking #3 is coming soon, I am left with thoughts of Fuwas and machine guns.

What exactly is a Fuwa? A Fuwa is a mascot of the Beijing Olympics in the great tradition of Olympic mascots. I mean, who can forget Izzy, 1996 Atlantic mascot.

In my 1997 trip to Atlanta, I bought an Izzy for $2.50. Beijing did not have a lot to live up but just to be safe, they came up with five fuwa mascots, which gives Izzy a run for his/her money.

Everything about the fuwas are so artificially cute that no one trusts them. Take their names, they are the Chinese style repeating kids name. Beibei, Jingjing, Huanhuan, Yingying, and Nini. If you take all the words together minus the repeating you get "Beijing huanying ni" which means "Beijing welcomes you". If you are about to get sick, you would not be the first. Then this artificial cuteness transitioned into superstition. It started with calling the Fuwas "the five friendlies" as it seems "friendlies" could be mis-interpreted. Then there are the bizarre events of 2008 for which the fuwas were blamed. Beibei was accused of causing the flash floods in southern china and for all the rain Beijing got this summer. Jingjing, being a panda, was thought to have brought on the devastating Sichuan earthquake. Huanhuan caused the torch protests. Yingying instigated the riots in Tibet. Finally Nini not to be outdone caused a train accident and a locust infestation. One of them must be blamed for the freakish spring festival snow storm which stranded 3 million people at the Guangzhou train station.

What does all this mean? Not much, a year from now you will still be able to buy a fuwa for $2.50.

And what does this have to do with machine guns? Well, today on my walk home from the subway the sky was blue and the air actually fresh. There is talk around about the terrorist threat which to me seems as real as the fuwas are evil. I mean, sure, like in any big world event there is a chance someone is going to take the opportunity to do something nuts. But compared to Barcelona in 92. Atlanta in 96. Athens in 04. You're kidding me right? This is not an open country, the event is being held inside a city with roads that circle the city in rings, there are hundreds of thousands of troops in town, ready for any type of flare up. But you cannot convince the Chinese of this, many I've talked too think the threat is greater than what Americans thought on the afternoon of Sept 11. Having been here during he protest against the Japanese in 2005, the only thing that concerns me is national pride and eager trigger fingers. Heaven help is if a Chinese gymnast loses to an American due to a bad judge.

It is this thought and another that is filling my head, and like most of my thoughts only a few will ever really matter. The other is how Beijing might, or might not, swing towards a modern society during the Olympics. I think this as I reach the intersection of the 4th ring road near our home. I see the Olympic volunteers -- two on each corners -- trying to direct pedestrians without a lot of luck. But at the far end of the intersection people are behaving. Why? Two 20 years old boys holding automatic rifles. Now, if that doesn't inspire a sense of security, I don't know what does.

Beijing has found a way to solve it's jay-walking problem. The much less effective Olympic volunteer is in the white hat with red flag.