Clearing the air about Beijing

Take a deep breath and get ready for Games

BEIJING - Right now, the sun's out. I swear. Well, kind of. If I were outside, I think I'd be putting on the shades.

That's what everyone wants to know, isn't it? Will the air clear? Will the sun be seen? Is the sky over Beijing ever blue? Will these be the Surgical Mask Olympics?

The truth is, no one knows for sure. The international scientific community is doubtful that Beijing can produce two weeks of Aspen skies with some quickie emergency measures geared to counteract two decades of unchecked industrial pollution.

But, for the second time in four days, there is discernible sun up there. That's all I can say.

So tomorrow night, rain or shine (they're talking 30 percent chance of precipitation), it begins. The long-awaited and much-discussed Beijing Olympics are here, and there's no turning back. China is throwing itself the greatest party the nation has ever known, and if anyone has a problem with that, tough dumplings. It's their $43 billion, you know?

The people here don't get why anyone else doesn't get it. If the Greeks, French, English, Swedes, Belgians, Dutch, Americans, Finns, Australians, Japanese, Mexicans, Germans, Canadians, Russians, Koreans, and Spaniards can put on a proper Olympics, what makes anyone think the Chinese, one of the oldest of all known civilizations, can't as well? The way they see it, what does China's foreign policy have to do with anything?

Oh, they're ready for the critics, all right. Consider the interesting piece of reading available to all the interested foreign journalists here covering the Games. The title of this free, 198-page book? "China's Tibet: Facts and Figures, 2008." You did note that possessive-signifying apostrophe, didn't you?

Let us, therefore, dispense with the notion that these Olympics have nothing to do with politics. The Baron de Coubertin has passed on to his final reward, and so has Avery Brundage. All modern Olympics are both professional and political. We all need to be grown up about this.

They're not messing around. They have constructed some magnificent facilities, starting with the extraordinary stadium nicknamed the "Bird's Nest." This 91,000-seat structure has one interesting distinction among all Beijing Olympic-related venues. It was originally designed with a retractable roof, which makes it perhaps the only new Olympic facility subject to a significant cost-cutting measure.

Vying with the Bird's Nest for the gold medal in building architecture is the National Aquatics Center, a.k.a. the "Water Cube," a structure that features steel lattices separating bags of inflated lightweight Teflon that resemble bubbles and make the building translucent. (Got that?) No architecture expert I, but it must be reported that it is a truly transfixing sight. Furthermore, it houses, according to five-time Olympian Dara Torres, an "awesome" pool.

Swimming will dominate the first week of competition. The sports world will be focused on the performances of American Michael Phelps, who could emerge from these Olympics claiming to be the greatest all-around swimmer who has ever drawn a breath if he wins the five individual events in which he is favored, plus however many relay events his team can muster.

Phelps dismisses the discussion. "You guys [the international media] are the ones who talk about it," he says. "I'm not saying anything. I'm just preparing to be the best I can, to be as fast as I can. My goals have never been made public."

Track and field, or "athletics," as these disciplines are known elsewhere, will be the big story in Week 2. The most anticipated and analyzed race will be the shortest and fastest. The 100-meter dash is always a marquee event, and this year the field is unusually loaded with the likes of Tyson Gay, Asafa Powell, and Usain Bolt. Winning the bronze in that event will be an honor.

And it is now the fifth Olympic go-round for American professionals in basketball. We have come an extraordinarily long way since Barcelona, when the one and only Dream Team did exactly what FIBA chief Boris Stankovic hoped it would do when he invited the ravenous fox into the international basketball henhouse. His hope was that the NBA stars would raise the bar for all to see, and that the rest of the world would be duly inspired to reach it. Back in 1992, I watched the Americans destroy the competition (trailing for a solitary 15-second possession in the entire Tournament of the Americas and Olympic experience) and decided that there might conceivably be a threat to American basketball supremacy by 2012.

Oops. I was off by more than a decade. We are currently champions of nothing, our last triumph on the international stage coming in the 2000 Sydney Olympics. On paper, we look good, although the United States team is alarmingly small. We have changed our way of thinking, adding role players such as Tayshaun Prince and Michael Redd to the mix in the hopes of creating a true T-E-A-M. The average American hoop fan cannot conceive of an American defeat. But the fact is Argentina is the reigning Olympic champion and Spain is the reigning world champion, and the US team had to work very hard to subdue a Russian team that wasn't exactly laden with NBA stars during a recent exhibition, not to mention an Australian squad that was not expected to contend for a medal.

We do know this: The opening game with China Sunday (10:15 a.m. Eastern) will be the most anticipated international sports event in China's history. Basketball has not yet achieved the status of table tennis in this country, but it is coming on fast, and the Chinese are tremendously proud to have a great player such as Yao Ming in their lineup. Just seeing their national team take the floor in their own land against the Americans will be an exquisite thrill for millions of Chinese.

All Olympics are a manifestation of national pride, but that concept has been turned up several notches in the case of the Chinese, who are acutely aware of their oppression at the hands of Europeans in the 19th century and Japanese in the 20th. The young people of China have been educated to think that the 21st century will belong to them, and so, in a very real sense, that century of Chinese destiny actually begins tomorrow night at 8, Beijing time, when the opening ceremonies commence.

Stand back, world, 1.3 billion people are coming through that door.

Bob Ryan is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at ryan@globe.com.