In another outlandish attempt to draw tourists and locals to the Olympic Green, the World Chocolate Wonderland theme park opened just north of the Bird’s Nest stadium to a mixture of awe and bewilderment. The strange assortment of exhibits and objects made of chocolate defies description. Ranging from individual showcases of the history of chocolate in countries famous for chocolate production, to an entire room of various chocolate reconstructions of household and consumer items, the focus and scope of the theme park is haphazard at best. Walking past the chocolate Terracotta Warriors, a Great Wall of Chocolate, and a life-size chocolate BMW, I couldn’t help but feel the theme park represented another exercise in postmodern irony. The visual feast was also picked up by the BBC and Salon. God knows what the Beijing municipal government will think of next to lure people up to the Olympic Green as they continue to struggle to support its grand infrastructure investments for the 2008 Olympic Games.
