I was talking with a future Guanxi contributor this week and he mentioned that his son in Beijing had “seen the bird’s nest.” I knew exactly what he meant because I’d just finished editing our July issue about the 2008 Olympics, and wrote the feature about the media and PR challenges of the event. Here’s a paragraph about the important of symbols:

“Take the need to understand cultural context: how many Westerners would understand why the (Japanese-owned) Shanghai World Financial Center had to alter its building design to eliminate a cut-out circle near the top (which was in the design to relieve wind pressure)? It’s because a circle on a Japanese-owned tower suggests a rising sun, something unacceptable to the Chinese public, with their memories of Japanese wartime aggression. On the other hand, the Beijing National Stadium, designed by the Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron and currently under construction, was more fortunate: for the Chinese, its design, which resembles a bird’s nest, is laden with positive meaning, because certain birds’ nests are a culinary delicacy eaten only on special occasions.” (from “Bringing the World to Beijing”)

Here’s a photo of the National Stadium, the “bird’s nest.”