That day in 2008 I was on Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China. It was an exceptionally busy at the square. Workers were preparing the giant space for the traditional October celebrations and for the start of the Olympic Games on October 8.
I took the pictures on 27/07/2008, a little more than two months before the start of the games. The access rules to the square weren’t very strict then. You could freely walk around without a bag-check, you could smoke everywhere and take photos wherever you wanted. Try that today ): I remember a very optimistic atmosphere; China got the Olympics, China was going to make it, going to be big, and everybody was going to be very happy.
A worker with a yellow helmet pushing a hand cart with pink flowers. A model of the Bird’s Nest Olympic stadium stands in the background. They were building a gigantic display with plants and flowers and structures and more flowers.
Taking a pic for the folks back home in Anhui. ‘One Dream’ is half of the One World One Dream official Olympic games slogan.
A very impressive display showing the Asian world map with a fiery red Olympic flame in the center. The continents were filled with flower pots.
In was a very hot day that day with many workers dressed in shorts and sun hats. They were all smoking and talking and having fun.
Another huge display under construction. On top it has the Beijing Olympic Games logo, it stands on another Beijing 2008 stand and that stands on an artificial hill.
A huge four-axle Puyuan crane lifting a huge billboard.
Puyuan is one of many brands under the famous construction machinery conglomerate Changsha Zoomlion Heavy Industry Science & Technology Development, better known as ‘Zoomlion‘.
A smaller triple-axle Puyuan on the other side.
一 二 三。。。LIFT! And up it went.
They installed it above another flower display.
Man with hat checking progress. All was fine.
A pretty old bus in front of the Monument to the People’s Heroes. Not sure about the brand unfortunately.
Strolling in the sunshine with the Great Hall of the People in the background. Note the Hyundai Sonata police car.
Truck delivering more flowers.
BLAC truck delivering range flowers. The driver looked way cool with sunglasses on and a cigarette in hand, checking stuff out, you know. The Beijing Light Automobile Company (BLAC) existed from 1968 until 2002 but many are still around even now. They are goof sturdy trucks mostly based on licensed Isuzu platforms. This blue example looked great.
Truck carrying Bonsai-trees. This is a JAC, not a BLAC.
The ladies’ corner.
A cool crane from XCMG, a competitor of Zoomlian. XCMG stands for Xuzhou Construction Machinery Group.
And finally a truly special Beijing BJ130 truck, made by the Beijing No.2 Auto Works from the early seventies until the late ’80’s. Strong little trucks, available in dozens of variations. This is a standard double-cab short bed example. Many BJ130’s were still in service in Beijing until at least 2011 but nowadays they are mostly replaced with electric stuff.
Man pushing a handcart with plants. He looked a bit surprised when I took the picture. He probably didn’t get I liked his cart. Huge wheels.
Nobody was watching.
It was then getting more busy and thus my time to leave.
Being brilliant the Chinese way. Hiding the bottom of trees with a photo of the bottom of trees. I had to look twice.