08.13.08

71 Cent Beers and the “Econ-O-lympics”

Posted in Beijing, Food and Drink, Olympics at 11:43 am by Benjamin Ross

Yesterday my friend Joe and I wanted to see some live Olympic action. Tickets have long been sold out, and the only way to acquire them is to buy them off of the second hand market. We had been told by Chinese friends that scalpers were charging outrageous sums, even for the most obscure events. Nonetheless, we headed over to the Olympic Sports Center in search of resold tickets. After about ten minutes, we were both able to find women’s handball tickets, for face value of 30 RMB (approx $4 USD). The handball matches were not scheduled to begin until 2 pm, so we decided to grab some beers, and stroll around the complex.

At a typical Beijing watering hole, a Tsingtao usually costs around 20 RMB, and we were expecting to pay at least this much to drink at the Olympic Games. You can imagine our surprise when we found that beers (Tsingtao, Yanjing, and Budweiser) were all being sold for 5 RMB (71 cents) each. You are even allowed to carry open containers around inside the park. After two rounds of beer, we entered the gymnasium to watch the match. I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast, so I bought a Snickers bar, also for 5 RMB. By the time handball was finished, we had each gone through three more rounds of beer.

Now for those of you who haven’t been counting, that’s a ticket to an Olympic event, a Snickers bar, and five beers…for the grand total of 60 RMB. At the current exchange rate of roughly 7 to 1, that comes to a whopping eight US dollars and fifty seven cents! It doesn’t take a mathematician to figure out these Olympics are cheap, dirt cheap.

Even granted that the cost of living in China is considerably lower than the United States, price gouging is not uncommon in the Middle Kingdom. Wealthy Chinese will often intentionally dine at extravagant restaurants or purchase over-priced event tickets as a means to garner face with guests and invitees. Likewise, many private establishments in Beijing cater to foreign clientele who are not accustomed to China’s low cost of living, and are more than willing to pay Western prices. Last weekend I had dinner at Houhai, a glitzy outdoor entertainment district in central Beijing. At the restaurant where I dined, a bowl of rice was 5 RMB, coke and sprite were 30 per can, and even a glass of ice water was going for 10. To watch the Olympic Opening Ceremony, I attended an all you can eat buffet at a Scandinavian style restaurant. The food reminded me of my junior high cafeteria and the price tag was 188 RMB (approx $27 USD) per head.

With many event tickets as cheap as 30 RMB and concessions sold just slightly above retail value, these Olympics are surprisingly affordable, even by Chinese working class standards. Knowing in advance that hordes of foreign tourists and their favorable exchange rates, as well as masses of affluent middle-class Chinese would be flocking to the capital, Beijing could easily have charged far more than they have been for tickets and concessions. Over the past three days, I have attended judo, handball, basketball, and boxing, and loaded up on concessions at each event. My total expenditures thus far…just a hair above 50 US dollars. Welcome to the 2008 Beijing Econ-O-lympics.

With prices this low, it’s actually cheaper to eat in drink inside the Olympic grounds than it would be to patronize local restaurants and bars.

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