Beijing is a lot busier than it used to be. There are more people walking around the streets.

I'm not talking about people just wandering around. It seems like everyone is walking with some sort of goal. They're coming from one place and they have to get somewhere else, and it has to be in the next five or ten minutes.

There are more and more cars. There are demolition signs wherever you look. New bars and office buildings pop up all over the place. Beijing feels bigger and colder than it used to.

Beijing no longer belongs to itself. It has become a stage. All kinds of people come from all over. They all have their own reasons for coming here. It's like there is a rule that tells them this is where they have to go to do what they want to do: "Beijing is the only place you can get famous. Beijing is the only place you can make money. Beijing is the only place you can release your potential. Beijing is the only place you can get what you want. So, come on."

And so they come.

People who had been living in Beijing in the 70s probably only make up 1/8th of the people in Beijing right now. The city is now filled with people who are here not because this is their home, not because they are Beijingers, but because they feel they need to come here to get something done. These people are not really any different from the people who came to live here before 1970, but now there are more of them. Now they are the whole city.

Starting in the 80s, China began trying to reach out to the world. The government has been telling people that they have to get the attention of the world, that they are performing on the world's stage. In the past China was concerned with what the world thought, but mostly we did things for our own good. People could look after their own lives and have their own goals. Now everything is about making China powerful, everything is done to impress the rest of the world.

In the past you would never have some foreigners interested in my story, the story of a Beijinger. But now there are reporters and everyone running around trying to figure out Beijing's place in the world.

In the past Beijing was just another city with people who lived there and went about their lives. But now it's something else, now it's become a place where people come to perform.

We keep pushing harder to perform better. The change keeps coming faster and faster and the city feels like it is spinning out of control. The Olympics is the most recent exhibition of this push.

I feel like the Olympics is a kind of doomsday. Everybody is pushing as hard as they can to get to this event. Everyone frames their life and their work to some degree around the Olympics. Buses have signs reminding people to behave well for the Olympics. Office workers know that a lot of their business comes from the Olympics, it is connected with the excitement and rush up to the Olympics. They also see themselves as helping to prepare for our presentation to the world.

A while ago there was a naked man standing by the lake yelling curses at the night. He was yelling in Shandong dialect, so I didn't really understand what he said, but I could hear him yelling, "Beijingers!" and "2008!" cursing and whining.

In the past you might have had these kinds of people, but he would be yelling because his wife had been fucked by different men. Now he's been fucked by the Olympics.

But after the Olympics, what then? Nobody knows what Beijing and China will be like. Everyone's working hard, but after all the construction and advertising, who knows what going to come out of all?

Beijing will change. The speed will change. Things will slow down. Once the Olympics is over, people won't have to push as hard anymore.

There will be compensation for all the rushing that has gone on before the Olympics, for the speeding up of everyone's lives. It's like if I hit you in the face, afterwards I'll have to pay you some money. There's going to be pay back for what everyone has to do now, there's going to be a time when everything calms down. And then I will smile.

Ren Yan was talking to Sweeble correspondent Michael Armstrong, in Beijing.