Best day in Beijing

8/17/08 5:46am Local Time, Broadcast Compound

Yes it's 5:45am, and yes I've been at work for about an hour already. Claire and I had to come in early because Bob Costas is broadcasting his entire primetime show live from the Water Cube this morning. I'm actually watching them set everything up right now for Dan and Rowdy to do a live pop in a couple minutes. I'm watching them on one monitor and listening to the producer and director on an intercom in our office on the compound. It's pretty cool to be hearing everything going on behind the scenes but seeing the final product that's being aired in America.

All of yesterday's excitement still hasn't quite settled in on me yet. After the whole Costas thing yesterday morning, I got to sit in the commentary booth with Dan and Rowdy to watch Michael Phelps make history by winning the 100 fly by 1 one hundredth of a second to capture his record seventh gold medal of these Games alone. That race gave me chills. The entire place went silent for the finish because it was so close. Everyone thought Michael had blown it because his finish was terrible and he took an extra short stroke into the wall. All heads turned up to the scoreboard and the whole crowd erupted in cheers as Michael jumped up in the water and Dan and Rowdy jumped out of their seats in pure elation. It couldn't have been a more perfect scenario -- no race gets closer than that and no swimmer has ever been as great as Michael Phelps.

After the session was over, Michael did a live interview with Bob Costas from the IBC and Mark Spitz, the only other person to win 7 golds in 1 Games, via satellite at his home in Detroit. Michael was on deck at the Cube when his mom and sisters came running down to hug and kiss him and he started crying. I was watching from the control room on our compound (it was on camera but not on air) and I just lost it and was crying through the whole thing. To see the happiness on Michael's face, hear the congratulatory remarks from Mark Spitz, and see the pride of Michael's family was so overwhelming. It was the greatest race in swimming history and I got to witness it. It gave me goose bumps. And seeing Dan and Rowdy get so excited on air was an interesting sight, too. The two of them were like little kids waking up on Christmas morning they were so excited. The whole experience was just incredible. Everyone everywhere is already talking about it.

In the women's 800 free a little later in the morning, a British 19-year-old broke a 19-year-old world record set by Janet Evans back in the '80s. It was the longest standing world record in any Olympic sport. Janet Evans was sitting in the commentary booth with Dan and Rowdy when her record went down, and I got to meet her when everything settled down after the race. She was hiding out of sight of all of the cameras because she was crying a little and didn't want anyone to see. I know how hard it is to watch someone break your own record, but I can't imagine what it must have been like to see her WORLD record that stood for so long get broken.

The last final of the day was the men's 50 free, and a guy from Brazil won it and started crying at the finish because he was so excited. He cried through his national anthem, too, and after his victory march around the pool, all of his teammates came rushing out of their seats onto the deck to hug and congratulate him. They huddled around him in celebration as he cried in the middle. I, of course, started crying for him, as well. It was such a great moment to witness -- so emotional and just so exciting.

After the morning's events, a few of the girls and I decided to go on a quick adventure into a random part of the city. We got off the subway and started walking and found a pretty cute little food market and some little pawn shops. We saw entire ducks displayed in the windows of the food vendors, as well as duck feet and wings and legs and everything else weird and gross looking. It's such a different world here! We also wandered into a small alleyway that had some interesting architecture and we found a strip of bars in a park along a river with long willow trees and low arched brick bridges hanging over the water. It was gorgeous and I ended up with a few really fantastic pictures.

The best pictures of the day, though, and probably from my entire trip here, came from our trip to the Great Wall yesterday. Our broadcast manager, Cathy, and our tech manager, Ken, took all 5 swimming interns and 2 of our editors in vans to the Wall. It was quite a shock on our drive out there because one minute we were in the crowded and congested city and then I closed my eyes and woke up to these towering and jagged mountains, all green in every direction and striped with rock, with this never-ending wall outlining the peaks. It was unbelievable even from a distance. When we got there, there was a strip of little souvenir shops with people hassling us like they do at the silk market. We saw men walking donkeys loaded with gear up and down the hill with all the shops. Those guys sell drinks to tourists on the Wall but have to carry them up and down every single day.

We all rode in a cable car to get up the Wall and the views from the top were indescribable. The mountains were endless and the Wall stretched over all of them. It was amazing to actually stop and think that I was standing on one piece of an over 3,000 mile long wall built so long ago. As we made our way down, it just got more beautiful with every step. The stairs were all slanted and crooked because the ground underneath them has shifted over the centuries. There were holes at the bottom of the Wall that you could just picture Chinese guards peeking through making sure no invaders got through so many years ago. We saw old cannons along the way pointing out over one side of the Wall, and down in the valley on that side was a great view of Mongolia.

There were hideouts along the way that had huge archways over narrow and steep stairwells that led down to safety spots. There was writing carved into every building and spears sprouting from the tops of each roof. The views were breathtaking. It was completely unreal to actually be there in the presence of so much history.

The weather was gorgeous for us -- by far the clearest day we've had so far, and not too hot or humid. After about an hour of hiking the Wall, we came to a point where we could take a toboggan down the side of the mountain. We each got our own little sleds and we were the drivers down a huge metal slide with big hills and winding turns. We had so much fun!

When we got back to the bottom, we did some shopping and I got a bright yellow T-shirt with a giant picture of the Wall and it says "I Climbed the Great Wall" in English and in Chinese and there is a giant picture of a Chinese dragon on the back. It's the ugliest thing I've ever seen, but that's what makes it so awesome. I had to have it!

After the shopping, our tech manager took us 5 interns to this American sports bar back in the city. He paid for drinks and dinner for all 5 of us! Our bosses say they're generous with us because they know we're not being paid to be here. I can't complain. I devoured a Hawaiian Pizza and we all shared a plate of nachos. It was so good to be having American food for once even though we're on the other side of the world!

Back in the pool today, Michael Phelps will be going for his record 8th gold medal in the final day of swimming competition and 41-year-old Dara Torres is a favorite for gold in the women's 50 free. We're in for some serious excitement here today on this last day of swimming!