Beijing Olympics 2008 - a crowning glory for China

I am still trying to find out why the Beijing Olympic is getting such a profound attention than the previous ones. At least that's what I am thinking, the last time I paid serious attention to Olympics was while reading about the great athletes in text books back in India. Nadia Komenich, Carl Lewis, Muhammad Ali, were all parts of our high-school syllabus.

Despite the initial criticism of lip-syncing and illusions in the opening ceremony, Beijing has exceeded expectations. It is noted that Beijing has spent $6.5 Billion just on security, about 4 times more than Athens. In my mind the key reason behind the overwhelming response on the games is that the event is happening in China, a so called developing nation. China has once again made its presence felt in the world, and that it can live up to its promises.

I spoke to few people who recently visited Beijing on business, and they were taken by surprise after looking at the infrastructure built around Olympics in Beijing. It looked so surreal, especially the bird's nest and the basket ball stadium, they hadn't seen anything like that in North America here.

India is bidding for 2020 Olympics, we have to see if India can win that bid, and if it does then how it fairs with Beijing. I believe Beijing has raised the bar; UK will need some serious planning and investments to meet or beat that standard in 2012.