Thousands of Hong Kong residents were lining up Monday through Tuesday in front of the Bank of China (Hong Kong) offices for commemorative HK dollar bank notes for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, due to be on sale from Wednesday.

A long line wound its way around the BOC Hong Kong headquarters in Central, Hong Kong, on Tuesday, as some had started to queue there as early as 7:00 a.m. the same day. By afternoon, many more had gathered in the rather narrow space.

Some took with them little stools, takeout lunches as well as umbrellas, which could be used to deal with either the scorching sunshine or the thunderstorms. The elderly were also seen, with some taking with them children they had been taking care of.

A security guard put the number of queuers at around 2,000.

"I am queuing for the commemorative bank notes because they are rare souvenirs to the Beijing Olympics, the first such event ever hosted by our country. They are worth a lot," said Tommy Cheung, who had been in the first four rows.

Cheung said he was buying the notes for private collection purposes.

"I did not have lunch," he said with a smile.

A young man said on condition of anonymity that prices for the bank notes had been going up, making it possible to earn several thousand HK dollars for each set.

The zest for the commemorative Olympic notes had been similar as what had been seen recently in Chinese mainland cities of Beijing, Tianjin, Nanjing, among others.

The Bank of China (Hong Kong), or BOC Hong Kong, planned to offer 4 million pieces of HK dollar-denominated commemorative banknotes for the Beijing Olympics, of which most will be sold in the special administrative region starting from Wednesday.

Many had started lining up in Hong Kong since Monday afternoon and hundreds held on late into night amid thunderstorms in front of the six designated branch offices of BOC Hong Kong, including the headquarters in Central and the Tuen Mun office.

It had been a sunny day with a few cloud patches during the day on Monday, but a rain storm came in the night, forcing the bank to register the queuing crowd. People started queuing again in the early morning on Tuesday, as the weather got better.

The BOC Hong Kong said in the afternoon that orders had been normal in the queues in front of their offices and that they have no plans for cutting the lines.

The bank said the 35-in-1 uncut HK dollar notes could be out of stock soon after they started selling the sets on Wednesday as scheduled.

(Xinhua News Agency July 16, 2008)