An Olympic salute to Beijing from a Greek

Taking a break from depressing sky-high oil prices and conflicts for energy sources is squarely in the true spirit of the Olympics. We are not close today to their ancient requirements: wars would cease while the games were happening. Anyway, let's all celebrate the Beijing Olympics.

Years ago China won the privilege to host the 2008 Games for all the right reasons. Virtually no other country, developed or developing, exemplifies the 21st century more than China.

An economic superpower already, it is bound to influence the world economy and politics like no other in the not too distant future. It also has one of the greatest assets, a huge population that is industrious, values education and is proud of its history and culture.

Only a handful of countries have a historical continuum that spans 5,000 years and, interestingly, China and Greece, now joined by the Olympics, would be in everybody's very short list that would fit this description.

I have been visiting China for the better part of 30 years and the country has become unrecognizable in almost all good ways. Living in Houston, one of the more dynamic US cities, it has been strikingly different for decades on how many more construction cranes have been dotting the Beijing skyline compared to those of my city.

Yes, Beijing and China still need work in services, bureaucracy and the environment but there should be no question that what has been achieved in so little time is more than any other country can show, perhaps in all history.

And yet, a world press, thriving incessantly on the negative which always sells more than the positive, applies the same on China, refusing to admit the obvious: the country is the epitome of modern success.

Even a week before the Games, members of the press still harped on whether China could meet air standards and, even more preposterous, whether food would be safe to eat, this in a country where food is an art and people have been known to travel just to taste it.

Tibet is the other item that often comes up in spite of the fact that the issue is truly irrelevant in the big scheme of Chinese politics. It is only brought up by misfit Westerners and Hollywood types who do not understand the Tibetan reality. Backlash inside China would have exactly the opposite effect they profess to desire.

What is rarely mentioned, and it should be, is that China has finished state of the art Olympic facilities in record time and along with them the country has produced a huge infrastructure that could only be the dream of every other country. Multiple-lane highways have sprung up everywhere seemingly all of a sudden.

The United States and Europe would be green with envy if they found out that China can build better highways in a fraction of the time that would take them. The Beijing airport is now the only state-of-the-art facility of its kind in the world and will remain so for years.

Chinese airlines, which one would have perhaps hesitated to fly just 10 years ago, have emerged as world class carriers with excellent service. They are also some of the best customers for Boeing and Airbus.

The Games should be China's celebration. It has arrived in the world scene as an imposing, influential and constructive presence. The country and its people deserve the salute of the world. They earned it both as a nation and as the hosts of the Olympics. Xerete, which in Greek means "enjoy yourself and be happy".

The author is a professor at the University of Houston and the Editor-in-Chief of the EnergyTribune

(China Daily 08/13/2008 page11)