Holiday Cash Pours into Capital
Beijing duck gets a roasting as tourists go crazy for top city flavour

Fifty photographers from 25 countries and 22 Chinese photographers yesterday started a week-long photo-journey in Beijing.

Their mission, to document the history and people of the capital, takes place under the banner of "World Photographers Focusing on Beijing." It is being seen as away of helping promote Beijing's bid for the 2008 Olympics.

The photographers will focus on more than 300 places in the capital, including scenic spots, schools, museums, shops and streets.

They said their photos will help the world learn more about the capital, its history and its people.

China's 2008 Olympics Bidding Committee handed in their application to host the games to the International Olympic Committee last month.

Beijing's competitors include Bangkok, Cairo, Havana, Istanbul, Osaka and Paris.

Many Chinese have offered to help the capital win the bid.

Chinese film director ZhangYimou took on the job of directing a10-minute short film for Beijing's bid to host the 2008 Summer Olympics earlier this month.

The photographers' work can be followed through the website: www.cww.com.

One of China's greatest tourist magnets-Beijing-has been counting the huge benefits of the country's first seven-day May 1 Labour Day holiday.

Although overall spending figures are not yet available, Zhang Qiubai, spokesman for the Beijing Municipal Commercial Committee, yesterday described the holiday, which usually lasts for three to four days, as an "extremely prosperous" season for all the major commercial districts.

He said eager customers not only filled every major department store in the city's downtown commercial districts, but also made it impossible for stores to close on time. The daily turnover at the big department stores soared 40 per cent more than usual. Queues for up to 500 metres during the seven day.

"Half the shoppers were from outside Beijing," Zhang said.

The total income of the city's 38 major restaurants increased by almost 25 per cent over the same period last year.

However, Beijing could have made much more if it had been better prepared.

"Yes, we had predicted that there would be a jump in the number of customers, and made preparations accordingly, but we found we were not prepared enough, either materially or psychologically, for the huge extra numbers," Zhang said.

Some customers complained that they had to wait a long time to pay for their shopping. They also said Beijing's shops closed too early, and that there were not enough choices of goods with obvious Beijing characteristics, Zhang said.

"Tourists just grabbed at goods reminding them of Beijing, such as roasted ducks, candied fruits, pickles and Beijing brand cigarettes," he said.

And the most popular, indicated by Zhang's statistics, was roast duck.

The Wangfujing Department Store sold 1,000 packaged roast ducks each day during the holiday, five to six times, and the Wangfujing Food Market sold 10 times more roast ducks than usual.