going for the gold

Last Sunday, after a thoroughly exhausting Saturday full of sightseeing, we took advantage of our "rest day," for once, and slept in. Having planned our traveling via the subway, it was a quick and easy trip to the Olympic Green.

I was with Sara and Caitlin and we were all quite excited. During the summer of the Beijing Olympics, I'd just graduated high school and nearly every night that summer a group of us could be found sitting in someone's family room, glued to the television. I'm sure for Caitlin, who is a Northwestern swimmer, this felt a little like your first time to Disneyworld.

It seemed as though the heat wave in Beijing had finally cleared. It was a beautiful, sunny day. The skies were blue and the air was free of the stifling humidity that usually hangs in the air. It was a perfect day to walk around outside; despite the vast concrete of the Olympic Green, it was a comfortably warm, breezy day.

It seemed that three American girls could not have been more in demand while we were there. For whatever reason, we were incredibly popular with the Chinese tourists that day. We couldn't go five minutes without someone asking us to take a photo with them; we easily posed for upwards of 20 pictures.

After admiring the buildings from the outside, we decided to get a closer look. Entrance to the Olympic Green was free, but we opted to pay extra to go inside the water cube because it was such an iconic building, and, in my mind, inextricable linked with the Beijing Olympics. I probably watched every Michael Phelps race that summer--you better believe we wanted to see the pool! There we are in the stands, cheering on team U.S.A., of course.

The pool was one of most enticing things I have ever seen. Over the past seven weeks, frequently trudging around in the sweltering heat, I have fantasized about jumping in a pool and here I was just feet away from one of Olympic proportion. The clear, pristine water was taunting me. Sadly, there I was little I could do, for I was sure that if I acted on this impulse I would be in a great deal of trouble with security.

Alas, there are plenty of fish, or shall I say pools, in the sea, but it was just utterly unsatisfying to only be able to admire this one from afar. Oh the sting of unrequited love..