China Daily.

One week ago, an intern from China Daily, Zhi,  (who also happens to be a University of Iowa student and friend), called my Chinese cell phone.  She wanted blog entries before the day's deadline.  That gave me one hour.  I edited three entries, added some photos, and sent it off in fifteen minutes.  Two days later, Zhi calls Emily about the rights to use a facebook photo she took of me for the profile picture (Zhi admitted she had been stalking my tagged photos).  Of course Zhi chose the least glamourous, one with me blowing a bubble at the BOCOG commercial.  

Yesterday, Zhi called again.  My photos weren't going to be published, the writing wasn't going to be either.  Instead, most likely because of premium space needed for more prominent Olympics stories, the story had been reduced to a quote.  What was the most surprising thing about the Olympics, Zhi wanted to know.  Out of tiredness from the previous night's lack of sleep, I had been camping on the Great Wall, I answered in a sarcastic tone.  I can't remember what I had said, but when Zhi repeated it to me, I realized just how superficial I sounded.  She promised me she wouldn't tell me when it was published.  

I found out last night that a photo taken the first night was published in USA Today.  You can find it by googling my name and USA Today.