Zhong guo Jia You! Or, the Olympic Torch in Zunyi
Trip Start
Feb 03, 2008
1
10
33
Trip End
Aug 16, 2009
Zunyi City,
Guizhou,
China
Monday, June 16, 2008
I barely hear her through the din.
In Chinese then, "Stop a minute, stop!"
I do, and a teenage girl with a determined look on her face carefully peels a sticker from a plastic sheet and fixes it squarely to my bare arm. Mission accomplished, she flashes me the biggest grin on the street and skips away.
I've been stickered. And I'm not the only one. Around me, hundreds of people are sporting stickers. Some, like my new one, are Olympic-themed. I've got the five Olympic rings now neatly placed over my freckles. Other popular ones are the Olympic friendlies-especially cute JingJing the Panda.
Me, Dan, the teenage girl and the whole town of Zunyi seem to be on the street this early Saturday morning. Today is historic: today the Olympic torch relays through town.
But most of the stickers, and about three out of four T-shirts we see aren't commemorating the Games as much as they are promoting patriotic slogans. Sidewalks for the week before were choked by vendors selling stickers, flags, T-shirts, caps, banners, headbands, pins, decals...
This is the biggest display of national pride I've ever seen
Looking out over Zunyi
. More than when the Czechs played hockey in the World Cup, more than any U.S. Fourth of July celebration I've attended. As the torch relay gets closer to Beijing, the Chinese people are getting more and more proud of their country. The protests against the torch before it reached these shores bonded the Chinese closer than ever. Most of my Chinese MSN contacts have a heart next to their names, showing that they love China.
Some of my students asked me if I'd heard of the anti-torch relays outside of China. It was incredible to them that anyone could think that mountainous territory west of here wasn't lawfully and rightfully a part of China. I carefully avoided these discussions.
On the street that morning, we saw people in full regalia-"I heart China" hat, stickers, shirt and flag. One man had attached keychains of the Olympic friendlies to his hat, intensifying the effect as they dangled in his eyes. Babies wore Jingjing T-shirts and headbands. Two boys walking a puppy had put a big heart-shaped China flag sticker on the puppy's head, confusing it as it tried to walk.
A few people were wearing normal clothes-sometimes with funny consequences. One man in a patriotic Chinese T-shirt was walking with his toddler grandson---what he must not have realized is that the grandson's T-shirt read "USA" in big letters. Ditto for the woman wearing a matching tracksuit outfit with "SPAIN" on her back.
A week before the torch came through Zunyi the city started getting ready for it, holding a rehearsal in which traffic to the relay streets-including the street we live on and the street we work on---were closed for the better part of a day
Fever
. Two days before the actual relay, crews erected iron-pipe barricades along both sides of the relay streets, even cutting off bus stops. These barricades kept residents on their streets and kept non-residents way. Many of my students tried to come and watched the relay, but since they didn't live on a relay street were told they had to turn back. Some who did live on relay streets were also turned back, or forbidden by their parents. There simply wasn't enough room for everyone. Other students were kept at school, even though it was a Saturday, to make sure they were not blocking the streets.
The streets were crowded, yes, but the people were fantastically happy.
As the time grew nearer to the relay actually starting-8 a.m.-- every service van or police vehicle that ran down the cleared street was greeted by huge cheers of "Jia You," or " Add Fuel." This common idiom is about the same as shouting "Go!" or "Come on!" in English. One T-shirt we saw tried to literally translate the cheer: "China, Refuel!"
Dan and I wandered down the stretch of our street that we were barricaded into, taking pictures of the crowds and often letting people take our pictures, with or without permission.
Midway down our street we ran into two groups of women playing traditional drums and dancing with flags. They were extremely happy to see us and got so excited getting their pictures taken with me that one of them pulled my hair while jumping at me
Waiting for the torch
. After 8 a.m., when the torch was on its way, we decided we needed a place to try and glimpse the torch. But where? The barricades were clogged with people eyeing the deserted street; we even saw a couple sitting on top of a garbage can trying to peer over the crowds. We settled for a driveway by police station and started to wait.
The first part of the relay showed up: Police, photographing the public photographing them.
Next, a huge Coca-Cola truck with music, uniformed dancers, and a lone foreigner with dreadlocks smiling and waving on the back.
After that, a gigantic Samsung truck also with music and dancers and its token foreigner. No mystery as to who sponsored the relay.
We were surprised by the two foreigners on the floats...Who were they? How do you get that job, dancing on a truck in the Olympic torch relay in a small city in China? Later I was also told that two foreigners had participated in the relay here but no one has been able to tell me who they are. What did they look like? I asked. "Tall and with yellow hair," they said. I guess they must not live here.
Finally, a bus drove by and let a man off: Our section's torch relay runner. By now the crowd around us was wild. Flags, some as big as our king-sized bed sheets, were waved with abandon. A man in front of us was already hoarse shouting "Zhongguo(China) Jia You." Dan and I tried to take pictures, but a sea of camera phones had cropped up on both sides
Selling Flags
. This was intense.The man, a grey-haired man looking like a city official, brandished his yet-unlit torch and shook people's hands. He must have felt like a rock star. A few minutes later a group of athletic men in white baseball caps surrounded our runner.
Through the waving flags and phones I saw a bright flash of flame: Fire from Greece had made it to my street in Zunyi. The runners lit our man's torch and he took off with the white-hat body guards.
The people around us started to surge. They all turned and followed the torch as it jogged slowly to the next relay runner. Dan and I braced and let the crowd of Beijing T-shirts and red "Go China Go" headbands and panda stickers flow by us. We had already walked to that end of the street, and knew that the barricade was up, with police posted every few feet. No chance of getting to see the torch again.
Our classes that morning had been canceled because of the impossibility of getting to work, so we had a few hours before the streets would open and we could freshen up before class.
Dan and I set our goal at taking pictures of the different patriotic shirts. It felt like a Sunday or a holiday.
At school later, the kids were tired and unfocused. We made red construction paper torches and ran relays around the classroom. One boy the next day had a huge hickey covering his left cheek. A sticker, he said. The glue wasn't meant for skin.
We're looking forward to watching China celebrate the Olympics. It promises to be quite a show, and I don't mean the games.
Comments
Very cool
It's good to hear a little about the relay from someone on the scene. Sounds, too, like you're having a mighty good time.
~Joe (from Prague)