Games hopefuls face test of characters
Hong Kong people who expected their spoken Putonghua to get them a pass to help at the Games have had their hopes dashed - applicants have to take a written exam even to be considered.
Expatriate and overseas volunteers who speak the language but have not mastered characters are finding themselves out in the cold as thousands of Hong Kong residents vie for a place among the handful of volunteers who will be selected to offer their services during the 2008 Olympics and Paralympics.
Yesterday, 1,600 Olympic volunteer hopefuls in Hong Kong sat written examinations in Chinese at eight school venues throughout the city. More than 3,400 are still awaiting assessment.
According to the Home Affairs Bureau, which is responsible for recruitment in Hong Kong, more than 5,000 volunteers have registered in the city.
The Beijing Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (Bocog) says 100,000 are needed to work directly at the Games' sites, while 400,000 will be recruited to provide translation, tourist information and emergency services away from the venues.
Hong Kong-based Briton Alison Shaw said she had been misled initially by the organisers into believing that her spoken Putonghua would be sufficient to volunteer, as outlined in Bocog's criteria for volunteer recruitment.
'The Home Affairs Bureau website called for volunteers, with information in English and Chinese. The initial application asked what languages you spoke. Nowhere did it state that you must read Chinese,' Ms Shaw said.
'Granted, speaking it is pretty essential. Reading is certainly useful, but volunteer jobs come in all shapes and sizes. I received a message in English saying my application had been accepted, presumably for processing. Later I received a stack of information through e-mail in Chinese. I requested an English version and got nothing. I was then told there wasn't one.'
When she called the bureau she was told she would have to read Chinese to be eligible to apply. According to the Bocog website, applicants whose mother tongue is not Chinese should be able to 'carry out basic conversations in Chinese'.
Asked if volunteers who could speak but not read and write Chinese would be eligible, an operator manning the volunteer hotline in Hong Kong said: 'In the writing exam it is required for you to write in Chinese and speak in Chinese.' '
Yesterday's tests consisted of a multiple-choice paper in Chinese and essays in English and Chinese, she said.
She added that it was necessary to check if volunteers could read Chinese because the training material provided by Bocog was in Chinese and no English version was available.
Volunteer army
Number of Olympics volunteers being recruited from the mainland, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan and overseas: 500,000
