Restart life

Chapter 380 0370 [It feels so good to sing the national anthem at the Olympics]

Water Cube.

Tao Xue was a little sullen. She had brought snacks with her when she entered, but she was stopped by security and not allowed to enter. She had to leave the food at the security checkpoint.

Once inside, there were many snack vendors, all provided by sponsors.

So the three of them bought drinks, sunflower seeds, and potato chips. But when they tried to enter the Water Cube, they were stopped again and told they could only eat outside the competition venue…

Chen Guiliang found the seat number on the scalped ticket and asked the audience member next to him, "Excuse me, are any of you two here together?"

No one answered.

Chen Guiliang raised his voice: "Who wants to exchange tickets? Two tickets for the third row, exchange them for two tickets here, the three of us want to sit together."

Someone immediately asked, "Is it really the third row?"

Chen Guiliang showed the ticket to the man.

"It really is the third row. Damn, buddy, I'll switch with you!" The man quickly stood up.

Chen Guiliang said, "I want to exchange two."

The couple next door also stood up and said, "We can exchange two tickets."

The tickets were quickly exchanged, and the couple happily headed to the third row.

"What matches are there this morning?" Tao Xue asked.

Bian Guanyue said, "It's all swimming. Three finals and six semifinals."

Tao Xue asked, "Can you swim?"

Bian Guanyue said, "No."

Tao Xue said, "I don't know either."

Taking the opportunity, Chen Guiliang said, "It's summer now, I'll take you to learn to swim sometime."

"You know how?" Tao Xue asked.

Chen Guiliang said, "I learned to swim in the river and reservoir by myself, and I almost drowned several times. The most dangerous time was when I picked up a piece of foam board on the riverbank and swam to the middle of the river while holding onto it. Suddenly, it slipped from my grasp. I couldn't swim at the time, and no one around me noticed."

Bian Guanyue asked anxiously, "Then how were you rescued?"

Chen Guiliang said, "Actually, the foam board was right in front of me, but I couldn't see it because my head was submerged. I thrashed my arms wildly across the water, sending the foam board further and further away. Just when I was about to drown, my fingertips touched the edge of the foam board. I didn't grab it, and the foam board was pushed even further away. That situation was very mysterious. I subconsciously calmed down, held my breath, stopped thrashing around, sank underwater, lunged forward, and then raised my hand to grab the foam board."

Tao Xue suspected he was lying: "How could someone who can't swim not panic? And how could they possibly keep moving forward underwater?"

"Why would I lie to you?" Chen Guiliang laughed. "That's why I said that state is very mysterious. You can calm down instantly from panic and use your rich experience of drowning many times to swim at least half a meter underwater before surfacing."

Even though she knew Chen Guiliang was alright, Bian Guanyue still felt a lingering fear: "You almost lost your life, can't you just behave yourself? What do you mean by having so much experience with drowning multiple times?"

Chen Guiliang still grinned and said, "Kids are all like that. Every summer vacation, the school emphasizes not to swim in the river, but every year one or two people in the whole town drown. I'm tough. I've drowned several times, but even the King of Hell won't take me. I guess he's afraid I'll steal his position."

Bian Guanyue said, "From now on, our children will be strictly forbidden from swimming in unsupervised areas; they will only be allowed to go to regular swimming pools."

Tao Xue rolled her eyes quietly after hearing this.

Chen Guiliang said, "Why don't you come up with a name for the child first?"

Bian Guanyue blushed and remained silent.

Tao Xue, however, was thinking: Would I have a child with my senior? Hmph, even if I did, the child would take my surname.

As they were talking, the athletes were already warming up.

The first event was the women's 200-meter freestyle semifinals.

In yesterday's preliminary rounds, Chinese athlete Pang Jiaying broke the Olympic record, advancing to the semifinals as the top seed in her group. She has a very good chance of winning the championship.

But there's something even stronger: in yesterday's preliminary rounds, an Italian athlete broke the world record.

Chen Guiliang took out his binoculars and began searching for the Chinese athletes.

Chen Guiliang couldn't remember his swimming results. That's why he came to watch the competition; a competition needs suspense to be interesting.

The first semi-final began quickly, with no Chinese athletes participating. A Slovenian athlete won first place.

Then came the second match.

When the Chinese athletes appeared, the stadium erupted in cheers.

Chen Guiliang said, "The atmosphere at the scene was great; it was much more engaging than watching it on TV."

“It’s a pity most people couldn’t get tickets. Give me the binoculars,” Bian Guanyue said.

Chen Guiliang handed over the binoculars.

Tao Xue asked, "Is this contestant very good?"

Chen Guiliang did her homework in advance: "In the last Olympics, she and her teammates won a silver medal in the freestyle relay."

As they chatted, the competition began.

"Pang Jiaying is so fast! She's been leading the way the whole time. Can she keep up the lead? Oh dear, she's turning too slowly... She's catching up..." The commentator's voice grew increasingly excited.

"come on! Come on!"

The entire Chinese audience cheered wildly.

Although Tao Xue didn't know the athlete, she joined in the shouting, her face turning red from shouting so loudly.

Bian Guanyue was much more reserved, clenching her fists and looking tense, silently encouraging the Chinese athletes.

"We've caught up! We've caught up! Third place in the semifinals group! This result is good enough for the finals!" The commentator, afraid of disappointing the Chinese audience, quickly added that even third place is enough for the finals.

"Ugh!"

Tao Xue sighed. As someone who was just watching the show, she was somewhat disappointed with the third place in the group.

Chen Guiliang said, "As long as I can make it to the finals, there's no difference between first and third place."

Next up was the men's 100m backstroke final. The cheers in the stadium were much quieter because no Chinese athletes were participating. They were eliminated yesterday.

After watching half a day of matches, Chinese viewers were not in a good mood.

The best result achieved by a Chinese athlete in the finals was 7th place in the women's 100-meter breaststroke... Chen Guiliang took the photos and posted them on two Weibo accounts.

The first message was congratulations to Pang Jiaying for making it to the finals, and best wishes for her to win the championship tomorrow.

The second message was a word of comfort: "Seventh place in the finals is pretty good. I hope Sun Ye can continue to work hard and achieve even better results in the future to prove herself."

After leaving the Water Cube, they ate lunch here, too lazy to go through security again, as they wanted to watch the afternoon's games.

Yes, Chen Guiliang also has tickets for the afternoon.

Diving, everyone knows what that means.

Tao Xue's voice became hoarse from shouting while watching the game in the afternoon.

Chen Guiliang and Bian Guanyue sat there silently, admiring the Chinese divers' ability to make their splashes disappear.

"Pretty!"

Chen Guiliang held up his binoculars and looked at the water with only tiny ripples, marveling at it.

Bian Guanyue said, "I saw your interview on TV. Chen Ruolin is your idol, aren't you going to cheer her on?"

Chen Guiliang laughed and said, "She's got such a strong drive, she doesn't need anyone to help her. I can just post some compliments on Weibo."

Tao Xue said, "I was also sent to train in diving when I was a child."

"You can't even swim, yet you're practicing diving?" Bian Guanyue asked.

Tao Xue explained, “In our area, there was a diving queen named Gao Min, and many parents sent their children to learn diving. One of my dad’s colleagues sent his child there, and I heard that he entered the provincial team at a very young age. My dad impulsively decided to send me there too.”

Chen Guiliang asked, "Then why didn't you go?"

Tao Xue said, "I went there for half a day. I kept crying and crying, and I couldn't practice at all. I also made the other kids cry, which annoyed the coach. He said I was a rotten apple that spoiled the whole bunch."

"puff……"

Bian Guanyue couldn't help but laugh out loud.

Chen Guiliang was pleasantly surprised; the two girls were getting along better and better. He took the opportunity to say, "You're quite capable too; coaches usually don't give up on their students easily."

Tao Xue said smugly, "How do you know I didn't cry on purpose? I'm afraid of water, I don't even dare to go into the shallow water."

Chen Guiliang said, "Look at Senior Bian, she learned so much when she was little."

"Omitted." Tao Xue stuck out her tongue.

Bian Guanyue smiled smugly. She didn't compare herself to others, but she was quite happy to have beaten Tao Xue.

As he spoke, he made his final jump.

Still perfect.

As the national anthem was about to play, Chen Guiliang and the others stood up.

This was the first time in Chen Guiliang's two lifetimes that he had ever sung the national anthem together at the Olympics.

That felt amazing.

Everyone was extremely disappointed when they left in the morning.

When they left in the afternoon, everyone was in high spirits. Even after they had walked off the field, people were still discussing the competition and speculating how many gold medals the diving team could win tomorrow.

Since it was still quite early, Chen Guiliang decided to drive to the Beijing Lottery Center to claim his prize.

"Hello, are you here to collect an award?" The staff member asked, noticing that Chen Guiliang was wearing a mask and a hat.

Chen Guiliang said, "Yes. I won 5000 first prizes."

The staff member's eyes widened in astonishment: "5000 first-prize tickets? What lottery ticket did you buy?"

Bian Guanyue and Tao Xue stood to the side, secretly laughing.

The main problem is that this lottery is ridiculous. Bian Guanyue also won a third prize. But it costs 2 yuan to buy a single ticket, and winning a third prize only gets you a little over 3 yuan. And there's even a small change!
Chen Guiliang took out a cardboard box he had brought from the car; it was full of lottery tickets.

The staff member, also a woman, was trying hard to suppress her laughter while checking the amount. However, upon learning that Chen Guiliang could take away more than 50 yuan without paying taxes (the prize money per bet is too low), she instantly became envious.

"Please show your ID and take off your hat and mask," the staff member said. "Don't worry, you can put your mask and hat back on when we take your picture."

"Do we need to take photos? Can we not take them?"

"Sure. But I'd still appreciate it if you could take some photos to promote it."

"I'm sorry, this is not my obligation."

"Ok."

I heard that someone came to claim a prize, and it was for 5000 first prizes. A number of staff members came one after another.

Even the leaders from the lottery center came.

They've been wondering for the past two days that the Olympic lottery is completely unworkable, and yet someone somehow won 5000 bets.

It's just baffling.

The moment the staff member saw the ID card, the name seemed familiar. She asked her supervisor, "Director, is Chen Guiliang a celebrity somewhere?"

The leader glanced at Chen Guiliang's ID card and, without even letting Chen remove his mask, warmly stepped forward to shake his hand: "Mr. Chen, aren't you afraid of showing off your wealth? Why don't you accept our publicity interview? Our lottery business isn't about making money, but about development..."

"Sorry! I have no obligation to promote your lottery."

Chen Guiliang interrupted him directly.

The leader's smile froze, then he smiled again, and simply handed over the bonus, making it a business matter.

Even after they received their awards and left, the staff were still discussing it.

"This person is really lucky; they won the first prize even after buying 5000 tickets."

"Sigh, rich people. I guess they're just buying it for fun and don't care about the bonus at all."

"It's really baffling that someone would buy 5000 tickets for the Olympic lottery."

"..."

(End of this chapter)