As basketballer Miao Lijie stretched China's lead over Belarus to 20 points with a three-point score with three minutes left in the game, the huge ovation rocked the display installed on a sponsor pavilion in the Olympic Green on Tuesday afternoon.

"This is so cool!" said Zhang Yi, a 21-year-old Beijing college student.

"Watching a game here might be less exciting than watching it live in the basketball stadium, but it surely beats seeing it at home."

Despite the 31 degrees Celsius temperature, more than 100 people sat with Zhang in a shaded clearing of about 100 square meters before a big screen on the Samsung promotional pavilion.

Many more chose to stand behind them in the scorching sun.

"This is not about watching a game," yelled Zhang, raising his voice against victorious roars from the crowd, "This is where you feel the Olympics."

Though officials with the Chinese delegation have said the country's charge for gold medals would not be as strong in the following days as in the first half of the Olympics, ordinary citizens showed no less passion toward their home Games.

Each day, tens of thousands of Chinese have flocked to the Olympic Green in northern Beijing just to catch a glimpse of the Games.

Over the past week, the park had received about 50,000 visitors daily, including event spectators and citizens with free tickets that are distributed to 10,000 Beijing residents each day.

"My family lives about 10 minutes walk from the Olympic Green. I practically watched the Bird's Nest (National Stadium) and the Water Cube (National Aquatic Center) being built," said a woman who identified herself by her surname Xu.

"My husband and I couldn't get our hands on a single ticket to the Olympic Games. But every now and then, we hear the audience's roar in the venues. We just want to be part of it."

Her 10-month-old son was obviously too young to be a fan for sports as "he dozes off from time to time," Xu said. "But still, we like to take him to the park to feel the Olympic spirit, and he does laugh a lot more than at home when he's awake."

Though she was a bit disappointed by Chinese hurdler Liu Xiang's withdrawal on Monday due to injury, "it really did not matter that much," she said.

"I am sure we can win at least 45 or 46 by the end of the Games, and that's a record," she said.

Shi Weihua, a 37-year-old nurse working at a local hospital, was a bit luckier than Xu.

"One of my friends managed to get me two tickets to the handball events the night after tomorrow," said the working mom queuing outside the Coca-Cola pavilion with her fifth-grader son Li Tong.

"It's a pity we couldn't get three, so I decided to let the boy and his father watch the game. Me? I'm lucky enough to be here right now. It's a beautiful place," she said.

At 11 years old, Li was an even more enthusiastic fan than his parents.

"It's summer vacation, and he spends every minute of his time in front of the TV for the Olympic events. He always pops out sports terms we have never heard," Shi said.

Li said he was a huge fan of Lin Dan, the Chinese gold medalist in the men's singles badminton.

"He looks so handsome when he plays."

Aside from the sports venues and the Olympic spirit drenching the Olympic Green, the promotional pavilion of the Games' sponsors are also a hot attraction.

At least 1,000 people queued outside the Coca-Cola pavilion at 3 p.m. on Tuesday, one of the hottest time of the day, for the chance to grab the Olympic torch for a few seconds.

"The Coca-Cola pavilion offers chances to take photos with a real Olympic torch in their hands and has thus become a hot favorite among visitors," said Li Xiaomei, an Olympic volunteer from the Beijing University of Posts and Communications.

Li, who offers guide and translation services at a crossing near the pavilion, said at least 10,000 people visited the temporary display daily.

Meanwhile, the Johnson and Johnson pavilion included five of the ancient terra cotta warrior statues from Xi'an and the GE pavilion had an artificial waterfall that spurted water in the shape of the Olympic rings, both attracting huge line-ups despite the scorching heat.

"You can see the same number of people queuing in front of the gift shop and the post office in the park. You will have to wait at least one hour to finally make your purchase or to send your loved ones a postcard," Li said.

(Xinhua News Agency August 20, 2008)