Beijing by Numbers
3,800,000
The number of calls received by the official Olympic hot line (952008) between 9 and 10am yesterday morning. Due to the system being swamped, ticket sales were suspended later that afternoon. Depending on who you trust more, China Daily or BOCOG , the official ticketing website recorded an average of either 200,000 submissions per second (China Daily) or minute (BOCOG) during the first hour of sales. What makes it worse is that of the 9,000 tickets that were sold between 9 and 11am, 98% were through either the website or at Bank of China branches. According to our math, that means that only about 180 tickets were sold over the hotline.
Organizers have apologized for the “technical problems” and have announced that those who managed to secure tickets will receive them and that they will have the problem solved by Nov 5. The official ticket site now looks like this.
-6
The temperature in Yanqing County last Saturday evening as the mountains in the area received their first fall of snow of the season.
30
The percent by which the number of passengers taking Beijing’s subway system has increased since prices were lowered and the No. 5 subway line opened in early October.
330
The height in meters of Beijing’s tallest building. The huge tower (the third phase of the China World Trade Center or Guomao Sanqi) that is going up on the corner of East Third Ring Road and Guanghua Lu in the CBD has finally stopped growing. Although the building won’t be completely finished until mid-2009, it reached its full height at 10.50am on Oct 29. The tower, which boasts 74 stories above ground and four below, will be home to offices, a five star hotel and - just what the area needed more of - a luxury department store. The project was officially approved in August 2002 but the workers didn’t start digging until June 2006.
555
The seating capacity of Airbus’s new A380 superjumbo, which touched down at Beijing’s Capital Airport last Friday. According to reports, the airliner was unable to take VIP passengers on a test flight due to the heavy fog covering Beijing on Friday. You can take a look at this clip on Youtube (which seems to be available again!).
561
The total length of Beijing's subway line in kilometers come 2015. Once the "Three Rings, Four Horizontals, Five Verticals and Seven Rays" have all been completed, Beijing is expected to surpass New York as the city with the world's longest subway line.
17,860
The number of copies of the hot-of-the-press Chinese translation of the final book in the Harry Potter series sold in Beijing on Monday. The Beijing Book Building led the field with 12,500 copies walking out the doors of the store in Xidan.
23
Kilometers in length of a string of firecrackers let off by government in Hunan province who were attempting to break a world record. The string took over one hour to explode and connected Dayao Town to the downtown area of Liuyang City, which also just happens to be home to one of the largest firework factories in China.
3,216
The number of Chinese men with the name "奥运 (Aoyun)" or Olympics.
120,000
The distance from the earth that China's moon probe Chang E No. 1 reached on Tuesday evening, as it boldly went where no other Chinese satellite has gone before.
Links and Sources:
The Beijing News: image
The Beijing News: 抢购奥运门票
QQ: 世界最长鞭炮湖南完工 重2900公斤长23公里(图)