Living in Beijing's Olympic 'bubble': Reporter's Notebook

BEIJING -- The bubble starts the second you get off the airplane, and there’s no missing it. Dozens of people in hazmat suits are standing outside the airplane doors. Even the baggage handlers are protected head-to-toe as they take our luggage off the airplane.

We’re quickly escorted to the first of many lines, and get the first of many personalized QR codes. Then of course comes the infamous "welcome to China" nose swab. We’d been warned that the PCR tests get way up there. Afterwards, there were many passengers with tears in their eyes. But the big news that had everyone whispering excitedly -- our daily PCR tests would be throat only! No daily nose dive. It’s the little things.

The process is complex, but efficient. Countless hazmat suits pushing you through the complicated system with precision and determination, all in about an hour.

The welcome to China experience is a quick introduction to the culture of these games. Thousands of people from all over the world are coming to a country where no one dares to break the rules. And there are a lot of rules: Don’t roll down your window in the car, no shouting at events, remember to record your daily temperature into the tracking app.

On any typical day in the bubble you may find out about new restrictions that came into place overnight, get told off for walking in a lane you thought you could but actually can’t, or get into arguments with volunteers that seem as confused as you about what rules to follow -- but are also deeply afraid to break any of them. The threat hanging over visitors: break any rules, and you may be sent to a quarantine facility.

The “Olympic closed loop” is a collection of bubbles. All fenced in with physical barriers keeping all of us separate from the rest of China. It’s likely the most ambitious bubble system ever created and it’s a feat to witness up close. One of the bubbles is more than one hundred miles from Beijing up in the mountain zone. There are dedicated lanes and parts of an entire highway have been shut down so that visitors can travel along in a moving bubble up to the mountains. I was told to go to the bathroom beforehand as there’s no stopping en route. Because even a side-of-the-road pit stop would be outside the bubble. But the most exciting part of the trip -- the bubble goes through the Great Wall of China. I was even able to grab a selfie as we whizzed past.

Another pro tip, bring snacks. While the restaurant at the hotel is delicious, there are no grocery stores inside the bubble. We aren’t the only ones planning ahead. We bumped into a Team USA dietician for women’s hockey and figure skating, who told us she’s been planning logistics around food for the team for more than a year. They even shipped over crates of food for the athletes ahead of time.

The hardest thing to wrap your mind around are the numbers. At any given time there are dozens of active cases in Beijing. As the country is still chasing zero Covid, a handful of cases feels like an outbreak. But the numbers are a minuscule fraction of the city's 21 million people -- roughly .0000038%. It is China’s crackdown to these numbers that is felt so harshly here inside the bubble. A zero Covid strategy that leaves athletes in a constant state of fear over testing positive.

Another cloud hanging over these Olympics -- diplomatic boycotts. The US and a handful of other counties including The U.K. and Canada have said they will not be sending an official government delegation to these games in protest of the Chinese government's ongoing persecution of Uyghurs, a Muslim ethnic group in the country’s Xinjiang region, which the US has deemed a 'genocide.' Many athletes we've spoken to are hesitant to comment. Multiple organizations have urged them to not speak out against these human rights abuses at the games, over fear they could be punished by the government while still in the country.

Despite the rules, regulations and geopolitics, these are still the Olympics. And even the stress of Covid can’t kill Olympic excitement. Signs saying “welcome to Beijing” hang on the walls barricading us from the outside world. And my personal favorite -- Olympic mascot Bing Dwen Dwen is everywhere! He’s the cutest mascot I’ve ever seen and I’ve already bought every piece of Bing Dwen Dwen swag I can find.

I recently bonded with Zhang Wenquan, an Olympic super fan here in Beijing, in a video call over our mutual love for the cartoon panda. Zhang owns more than 5000 pieces of Olympic memorabilia and is heartbroken he won’t be able to attend this years games as only invited VIPs are allowed in. But his excitement is palpable, even through the screen. And as he reminded me, more than anything else, the Olympics are about the world coming together.

So a very happy Lunar New Year from Beijing. And while I can’t be shouting for Team USA, you better believe I’ll be clapping my loudest.

ABC News' Karson Yui and Ibtissem Guenfoud contributed to this report.