Thurs Aug 14 -- Before the volleyball game

We headed back to the hotel for a quick nap and then onto volleyball. I hadn’t been able to know ahead of time what games were scheduled and finally found a specific schedule online (I was able to finally get on line for the first time when I got home – the hotel sent someone up who knew enough to get it going again). It turned out that the first game was going to be China / Japan and the second game US/Bulgaria – which meant it was a fantastic night to go. Japan is China’s archrival, which would mean the game would be fun and loud. And of course, we would cheer on the US in the second game as well. The only problem was getting there. The directions got us somewhat close via a subway, but then the directions said to take an Olympic bus from the subway to the venue. From my few days of experience, catching a bus –well, catching the right bus – is very difficult. First, they have a lot of busses. Second – it’s never really clear when you get out of a subway station which direction you are headed. Nor is it easy to find someone who really knows enough English for you to trust their answer. So true to form, we took the subway as far as we could, got off, when to look for a special bus – only to realize we had no idea if were on the right street and/or the right direction to catch that bus (the subway station has 4 different ways to exit, each of which puts you either on another street or opposing directions. You run the risk of either getting on the wrong bus or the right bus in the wrong direction. We tried to stop someone who was helpful, but we again didn’t know if they really understood us or gave us good directions. We went under a bridge as directed, only to find another intersection with buses going 3 different directions. We finally walked to a mall, asked help from a jewelry store clerk, showed her a map, and she was kind enough to write directions in Chinese that we could give to a cab driver. Then we just caught a taxi there instead, skipping the whole bus thing.

We got there early enough for the “pre-game” show…which consisted of many different Chinese drill team and cheerleading routines. We got a kick out of many of them because they definitely tried but didn’t yet have the dancing / rythym thing worked out yet. Which made it all the more entertaining.