The Vancouver Sun runs a sidebar in its Road to 2010 weekly feature called Collectors' Corner ... and it seems tailor-made for this blog. Enjoy.
What: Vancouver City Chinese-language sponsor pin
Value: $40 for each of two types
History: Vancouver is one of four civic government partners in the 2010 Olympics and Paralympics. The others are Richmond, West Vancouver and Whistler.
Vancouver took its status to a new level, commissioning a pin in two styles of Chinese language; one in simplified text and the other in traditional characters.
The city bought 500 each through Artiss Aminco, the official 2010 pin producer for the purpose of giving them to visiting Chinese dignitaries and Chinese residents and taking them to Beijing for the 2008 Summer Games.
In their own right the pins are worth perhaps $20 each. There the story might have stood had it not been for one of those tiny mistakes that translate into major political goofs.
Artiss Aminco accidentally had the pins produced in Taiwan, Republic of China, instead of at its regular facilities in the People's Republic of China.
The PRC considers Taiwan to be a renegade province, and the stamp "TAIWAN" on the back of the pins was not discovered until most of the pins were distributed.
For the sake of political sensitivity, the city scrapped the remaining pins and pledged to re-order more made in China.
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