I arrived in an old terminal at PEK — not the fancy new one — so I was a little surprised to see a Hermes shop inside.

Two people decked out in the costumes of two of the Olympic mascots greeted us in the terminal area. The airport was decked out with Olympic sponsorship signage — UPS had signage on the baggage collection area, Samsung had billboards and Panasonic had some signage as well.

The area where my hotel is looks about like what you would expect an Asian city to look like. Not that I have any idea what that is, but this was it. There are a lot of concrete buildings that look dated. Most are white and crowned with Chinese symbols.

The city was hazy yesterday when I arrived. It looked like an overcast day in New York. The next morning, it was a little worse. I couldn’t see the buildings outside the hotel window that were there the day before. Everyone says the air’s way better than it was a month ago, though.

Quote of the day:

“I’ve had to change the time on my watch before, but never the day.” — Chester Wheeler, the USOC director of corporate sales and licensing