BEIJING - Yan Ligang has probably the lowest profile job of the 22 department heads in the Beijing Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG), and he would like to keep it that way.
Yan is in charge of the Olympic Logistics Centre, responsible for the procurement, storage and eventually disposal of millions of items required for August's Games -- from precisely 34,562 ping pong balls to thousands of fridges.
"If one piece has a problem, it will lead to a bad result for the whole Olympic Games," Yan told reporters on Tuesday.
"If everything goes well, nobody will think of us because we are in the backroom. But if there is any problem, people will think about us and blame us."
Presiding over an 80,000 square metre warehouse in the Beijing suburb of Shunyi, Yan admits the onerous task of procuring and keeping safe the "Olympic materials" occupies his thoughts, even in the dead of night.
"Things are going relatively smoothly at the moment," he added. "But I still feel like I'm walking on ice. I even dream of my work at night. The thing I worry about is how to guarantee our supply."
Once the Games have come and gone, though, and Yan can stop worrying about "rats getting into the warehouse and biting important apparatus", he has already visualised his celebration.
"I have a dream that at 8:08 p.m. on August 8, 2008, I can watch the curtain raising, the flame burning, the great event beginning at the opening ceremony," he said.
"I have a dream that after the closing ceremony, I can get drunk with my colleagues, who have been fighting hard with me for long.
"I have a dream that all the 870 staff in the logistics department, from different countries and regions and of different age and experience, will be One World, One Dream, One Team."
"I have a dream that all my team members will be like a beloved family forever. It is precious luck to know each other when we devote ourselves to the Olympics together. We will be forever friends."
