More than 10 thousand songs have been submitted from around the world since the campaign for a Beijing 2008 Summer Olympic Games song competition was launched.
Among the submissions was one from Albert Lam, Hong Kong’s number one lyricist, who has produced thousands of songs for pop stars all over Asia. His Olympic song entry is called “Dream Within Reach”, which he says echoes the Beijing Olympic spirit of “One World, One Dream”.
Another applicant is Peter Kam, last year’s winner of the Berlin Film Festival Best Music Award.
Meanwhile, in anticipation of the 2008 Games, Beijing’s tourism industry and its hotels want to break records during the Games when the city welcomes more visitors and the hotels earn more money than ever, reports AFP..
Beijing budget and star-rated hotels are raising room rates expecting high capacity during the Games. A hotel booking official said, “you can still get a room but we prefer cash and block booking, not just a night or two.
Xiong Yumei, deputy head of Beijing’s tourism administration, said the city would offer beds for about 500,000 overseas visitors in August 2008.
There are now 700 star-rated hotels in the city and another 100 are being built or renovated this year. “Altogether we have about 570,000 beds, capacity will be no problem”, the official said.
