A uniformed guard protects Beijing's topiary Olympic pride.

On a sunny "Blue Sky day" (an official meteorological phrase in smog-plagued Beijing), the very kind of clear morning all Chinese hope for on the opening day of the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics, I take a taxi to the Olympic Green to watch a gymnastics trial competition.

The Green is home to several major venues: The iconic metallic National Stadium (the "Bird's Nest"), site of the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, is here, as well as the eerily iridescent National Aquatics Center (the "Water Cube"). My destination at the Green is the so far nickname-free National Indoor Stadium.

Officially, the facility will not open until August 8, 2008, precisely at 8:08—no coincidence given that 8 in the Chinese culture is a magic lucky number, just as 7 is in the West. And to have five 8s opening the Games at a site that is on the same extended meridian line as the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square...well, how cross-axially, numerologically, and feng shui perfect can an Olympics Opening be?

The media saturation reporting every Olympic factoid is relentless. During my first sojourn to Shanghai in December 2006, the CCTV stations were already broadcasting documentaries, athlete profiles, slogans, construction updates, and other related Olympics "news," all branded by a ubiquitous pictograph logo of a bright-red dancer in a flowing calligraphic style. That same month, I watched Chinese TV broadcasters nightly and openly marveling that the national teams were kicking gold medal butt at the Doha Asian Games, dominating the mighty Japanese in practically every competition, including swimming. For many Chinese, the Doha Asian Games were a reassuring dress rehearsal for achieving dominance in Olympic gold medals.

Today, BJ (as locals call it) is decked out with Olympic paraphernalia. Obelisk-like digital clocks that count down to the Opening Ceremonies tower over popular spots, especially on major thoroughfares and at tourist attractions, including Tiananmen Square. The red dancer pictograph and the five Olympic rings are integrated into electronic street ads, storefront signs, flyers, shopping bags, and product packaging for everything from cookies to electronics.

If one person is directly fueling the Chinese people's interest in all Olympic sports, it's Yao Ming. On billboards in malls, buildings, subway lines, and buses, the Houston Rockets star center, already a large man by any standard, looms even larger over the crowds. He's rolling out Visa card's newest campaign: "Only card accepted at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games." Yao is China's most prominent world citizen, an overt symbol of just how strong, big, and rich China has become in less than three decades. The most-watched live TV show, broadcast during my first Saturday morning in Beijing, was an NBA game featuring Yao Ming against Yi Jianlian, star power forward for the Milwaukee Bucks—not the Rockets vs. the Bucks, you understand, but Yao Ming vs. Yi Jianlian.

The approaching Olympics have also catalyzed hot discussions of pollution solutions. Locals endlessly debate the best policies to provide those elusive Blue Sky days for foreign guests. One favored solution is to ban cars on alternating days during the Games, based on license plates ending in odd and even numbers, affecting a total of 1.3 million cars. Beijing has already deployed a fleet of new clean-fuel buses and plans to open several new subway lines before August.

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