Beijing’s Bird’s Nest Stadium Will be Turned Into Shopping Complex Entertainment

The area around Beijing’s massive Bird’s Nest stadium will be turned into a shopping and entertainment complex in three to five years, a state news agency said.

Officially known as Beijing National Stadium, the showpiece of the Beijing Olympics has fallen into disuse since the end of the games. Paint is already peeling in some areas, and the only visitors these days are tourists who pay about $7 to walk on the stadium floor and browse a pricey souvenir shop.

Plans call for the $450 million stadium to anchor a complex of shops and entertainment outlets in three to five years, Xinhua News Agency reported, citing operator Citic Group. The company will continue to develop tourism as a major draw for the Bird’s Nest, while seeking sports and entertainment events.

Source: sports.yahoo Images:beijing2008

Diamond Visa Credit Card Shines in Kazakhstan

ALMATY (Reuters Life!) - Sick of the global credit crisis? Get yourself a diamond credit card as consolation.

A bank in Kazakhstan, an oil-rich Caspian nation, has unveiled a new VISA card encrusted with a shiny 0.02 carat diamond and laced with an elaborate gold pattern.

"It's (designed) for a private club of VIP clients," said Dmitry Nikolin, executive director of Kazakhstan's mid-size Eurasian Bank which released the card on Tuesday.

The card will be issued for clients with an annual income of at least $300,000, targeting a thin layer of affluent consumers in a vast nation where the average monthly wage is about $500.

Nikolin told Reuters it was the first VISA card of this kind in the world and will be offered to clients beyond Kazakhstan.

Like other resource-rich former Soviet states, Kazakhstan developed fast on the back of booming commodity prices but a sharp downturn in oil prices this year and the end of credit expansion has snapped its double-digit economic growth.

Kazakhstan is now facing the challenge of growing social tensions as the crisis eats away at people's savings and widens the rich-poor divide in a nation where up to one quarter of the 16 million population lives in poverty, according to U.N. figures.

Via: Reuters