474 days to go
It was the taxi driver saying 'eleven' in English that made me realise how preparations for the Olympics are really taking shape.
Alighting from the green taxi with an orange band outside the office, I reached forward to pay the 11 yuan on the meter when he said it. He took the notes, smiled and said 'bye bye', leaving me dumbstruck on the pavement.
At my local jiaozi emporium, where the dumplings provide enough energy to keep a team of long-distance runners going for the duration of the Beijing Games, the waitress took my order and said: 'Please wait a moment.' Even in this tiny hole in the wall, people are brushing up on their English.
The impending games have wrought innumerable changes on the physical landscape, but these scattered, random examples of spoken English are a sign there is also something changing in people's minds. English is not widely spoken in China, but as the Olympics loom people are keen to have at least a couple of words to say to the foreigners coming for the games.
In nearly four years on the mainland I've never heard a taxi driver speak English. There are supposedly 330 million people learning the language in China, but most are shy about trying out their new skills. Occasionally you will hear 'bye bye', as much a linguistic import from Hong Kong as maidan when the time comes to pay the bill.
