My job as a fencing flash quote reporter finished on August 16th so I had a lot of free time on my hands to experience Beijing both during the day and at night.  So after a little bit of exploring and spending many a Chinese Yuan, we heard about a few places that all of the athletes and celebrities like to go to at night.  The three places that came up the most were the Volkswagen house, the Heineken (Dutch) house, and Budweiser’s "Club Bud”. Sponsors during the Olympics really make it their job to market their product in the best way possible.  Many have set up interactive buildings all over the Olympic green to market, while these three decided to go a different route.  The “houses" and "clubs" are set up to give the athletes a place to celebrate their wins, cheer up after their losses, meet other athletes, and just have a good time by relieving themselves of the pressures of competition.

So after some deliberating about which place to go to, a few others and I decided that Club Bud sounded like the most fun.  Club Bud was originally a part of the Beijing Agricultural Exhibition Center which Budweiser rented out for the games and turned it into one of the hottest places to go in Beijing.  When you walk in on your left is the dancing aspect of the club with loud pumping music courtesy of a DJ. It has a huge dance floor with podiums placed on the perimeter of it where people who want to show off a little bit more of their moves (or lack there of) can dance. Across the way is a lounge area, with yet another DJ, plush sofas and a special V.I.P spot in the middle. Through the lounge guests can reach an outdoor terrace, complete with pool, another DJ, love seats all around, and artificial grass and rocks to give the feel of a real outdoor tropical experience.

This all sounded great to me however the problems I had were that I didn't have a ticket into the club, I was not a celebrity, and being an Ithaca College Intramural Sports Champion didn't quite count as being an athlete.  But after my opening ceremonies experience marching with team USA and finding my way into seats five rows from the court at a USA basketball game ( courtesy of Dr. Guan), I thought that nothing had stopped me from doing what seemed impossible beforehand so why would it start now?

I headed over to Club Bud at around 11 P.M. because the doors had opened at 9 and everybody knows that the important athletes and celebrities always come late to things like this so they can make as big of an entrance as possible.  Upon arriving at the gate I started thinking of a game plan about how to get in. I stood outside the gate waiting for something to come, when finally it did.

A few of us briefly started a conversation with an Australian guy waiting outside and mentioned how difficult it is to get in and how I tried to get tickets but had fallen short.  He said his buddy was an Australian rower and was coming out to get him in and could probably get us in as well; bingo!  As his friend the rower walked towards the gate and was talking to security, the Australian guy helping us yelled, “Hey, four Americans too.”  The somewhat puzzled rower quickly caught on and pointed the four of us out to come in as well.  Once through security we thanked both of them for their help and headed into the club.

After a few hours of wandering around, the mood of the club shifted with some new arrivals. In walked Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte, Matt Grevers, Cullen Jones and a few other friends and teammates from USA swimming. They walked straight into the V.I.P. area so they wouldn’t be bothered as much. The problem with this was that the V.I.P area was smack in the middle of the lounge with only some rope to block it off.  It basically put Michael Phelps and company on show as a spectacle.  Everyone in the club had surrounded him on all four sides taking pictures of him with flashes everywhere.  He motioned to his friend that he he wanted to get out of there and they left for a V.I.P corner on the outside terrace.  

The night ended with a few of us eventually sneaking into that area and snapping some great photos of Mr. Phelps. As the club was closing and Phelps was leaving I managed a quick handshake with him to congratulate him ( Brant somehow got two handshakes).  All in all the night was pretty amazing and we got to meet some cool people, and we eventually got tickets for 2 more nights where we met and saw people like softballer Jennie Finch, volleyballer Kerri Walsh, boxer Evander Holyfield and soccer player Ronaldhino.  What an end do a great Olympic experience.