Two Days Out – That’s Right, TWO days out.

Up in Beijing, they need to wait three more days for the Olympics. But down here, in Shanghai, the fun begins on Thursday, with a soccer* double-header at Shanghai Stadium. Rightfully, the world’s attention has been on Beijing and its preparations (see Fallows on Beijing, four days out). Nevertheless, based upon the number of people arriving at this blog via searches for things like “shanghai football pollution,” I sense that there is a hunger for some real-time info on just what things look like over at the Shanghai Stadium. So, around 10 AM I took the number 1 subway line down there to have a look for myself – and for this blog’s faithful readers.

First things first: blue skies all over the place!

Of course, as many others have noted, blue sky doesn’t necessarily mean clean sky (and hazy sky doesn’t necessarily mean polluted sky). And the Shanghai Stadium neighborhood might be particularly misleading in that regard, in that it sits in the middle of a giant highway interchange.

Over the course of an hour, I tried to find the right spot to get a photo that could convey the scale of the spaghetti junction that exists next to the stadium. But then I came across this pipe and topiary and I just couldn’t resist. It’s directly across the street – and beneath an overpass – from the Huating Hotel, which is serving as Shanghai’s Olympic Village, and across a hairpin and beneath two overpasses from the Stadium itself.

Just to be clear: I have no data on the air quality in this area. And, after walking around for 90 minutes, I came to a very firm conclusion: the heat, and not the air quality, is the factor most likely to depress athlete performance during the soccer matches. At the time I was walking around the Stadium, the temperature was 33� C, or 91� F – and wickedly humid. I’m in decent shape (workout 4-5 times/week), and I was totally drained 45 minutes into my walk. Now, consider that the first two Shanghai matches (on the 7th and 10th) are scheduled for 5:00 PM starts, and you have to wonder how the players will hold up … not to mention the spectators. In either case, according to Shanghai Daily, temperatures should be a little bit lower on Thursday.

Which brings me to my one and only Shanghai Olympic concern. Organizers have told spectators that they will not be allowed to bring food or beverages into the Stadium. The question then arises: how much will they charge for water at the concession stands? I can’t imagine anybody getting worked up about the Serbia-Australia match on the 7th. But boy, I could imagine some ugliness if the price of bottled water exceeds, say, RMB 15/bottle (US$2.20). Then again, this being Shanghai, I’d be disappointed in anything less than shameless profiteering. Brace yourselves.

Anyway. Compared to what I read about Beijing’s security situation, the area around Shanghai Stadium was very low-key. Along the south side (I think it was the south side) of the Stadium, which faces a highway overpass, PLA guards are stationed at roughly 50m intervals. But, other than that, there was no great show of force – or weaponry. Businesses in the area are open, and the Starbucks and Cold Stone Creamery located in the base of the adjacent Shanghai Indoor Stadium have become – at least, this morning – places where PLA soldiers can take naps out of the heat. Sections of the stadium are surrounded by high fencing, such as you see here:

But in most other places, there’s little more than stanchions and metal detectors blocking spectators from the venue. And that is, I believe, how it should be.

Which brings me to the final stage of this little tour: the ticket office. As I noted last week, when I made this same circuit (in cooler weather), you will not find Beijing’s rabid ticketbuyers here. Heck, you won’t even find a line. But you will find a salty old dude with a soggy cigarette in the corner of his mouth, scalping tickets to college kids (toward the left, in the photo below):

Which is really strange, if you ask me, because if the goal of these students is to attend an Olympic soccer match, well, there is no shortage of tickets at the box office. Contrary to the sell-out rumors, as of this morning, tickets are still available to six of the nine soccer matches to be played in Shanghai (the three sell-outs are the preliminaries on the 7th and 10th, and the men’s semi-final on the 19th). Including, it’s worth noting, very good seats to the bronze medal match, and vast numbers of tickets for womens quarter and semi-final matches.

At this point, I think it is safe to say that Shanghai will not sell out. This shouldn’t surprise anyone: there’s a notable lack of enthusiasm for the Games here, as evidenced by the small number of locals and tourists to be found around the Stadium (as opposed to what Fallows and others describe in Beijing). From this lone outpost, that’s kind of a pity. After all, who knows when the Olympics will next return to Shanghai?

So: Go. Buy. Tickets. Go buy them now. It’s the !@#$% Olympics, for goodness sake! What’re you waiting for? And I’ll see you in the stands come Thursday. Two days out!

*As of today, the Shanghai Scrap Stylebook has adopted the American term “soccer” for the game that everyone else in the world calls “football.” I offer no justification or excuse other than the fact that I’m an American, and I always feel like I’m copping some kind of attitude when I use the international term.