NFL brings out the big guns to kick-off a new American football season: the Oakland Raiderettes. City Weekend sits down with the black, white and silver clad cheerleading squad to ask just what the NFL is doing to promote American Football abroad and what the Raiderettes are doing on their whirlwind tour of China.

Knee-high boots, short shorts, long hair and glitter. Four Raiderettes — the cheerleaders of the Oakland, Calif., Raiders football team — swung their hips, whipped their hair and moved to the music at Beijing’s La Bamba restaurant in Wudaokou and Hui Xian Tang bar in Houhai. Naturally, they’re pretty hard to miss. “It’s the weirdest thing I’ve seen in Beijing,” said Neil Birkholz, a 23-year-old from Denver, Col., who teaches English and was at the La Bamba portion of the show. “Seeing these cheerleaders is definitely an eye-opener.”

This pompom brigade is the first of a large-scale campaign by the National Football League to kick off not just the new season but also the introduction of a whole new competitive sport to China.

Featuring the Raiderettes is the first of an entire fall schedule that includes Tuesday night viewings of the weekend’s football games at both La Bamba restaurant in Wudaokou and Hui Xian Tang. The Raiderettes won’t be able to stick around, but according to NFL China, in addition to the weekly football games, they’re offering video on demand of the games through Sina.com. City Weekend consults the cheerleaders about the NFL’s plans in China.

City Weekend: What’s the purpose of your trip to Beijing? Erica Kofoed: We’ve been promoting the NFL in China, getting people excited about the game and performing for people to show them what we, as the Raiderettes, do every week.

CW: How has the reaction been to seeing the Raiderettes walking around China? Ashlee Marks: Quite a bit of the Chinese just stare at us like, “What’s this all about?” They come right up to us and examine our outfits and our faces. It’s as if we’re completely new to them and they’ve never seen anything like it.

CW: How long are the Raiderettes in China and what else will you be doing as part of your visit? EK: We arrived in Beijing on Saturday and will be heading to Shanghai on Wednesday, September 10. Since getting here, we’ve visited the universities as well as the offices of Sina.com, and have been trying to educate the Chinese on the sport of football.

AM: We’ve done several question and answer sessions where we’ve talked about everything from the helmet and uniforms (for us as well as the players) to basic plays teams will run and how the different positions work.

EK: We break down the different teams for everyone, the divisions, how the playoffs work. We’ve shown actual game footage. We’ve helped them navigate through the NFL and NFL China Web sites. This sport has a big fan base in America and we’re also really trying to show the size of that fan group.

CW: How hard is it introducing a “new” sport to people? AM: Everyone knows the NBA here in China now that Yao Ming plays. Even Major League Baseball held games in China this past year [San Diego Padres and Los Angeles Dodgers in March 2008]. Now it’s the NFL’s turn.

EK: In getting more people to know about the NFL, just like those other sports, we’re showing them football has that same athleticism, big athletes and exciting atmosphere. But unlike basketball, which only fields five players on each side of the court, we’ve got to work harder to explain how football works.

CW: What places have the Raiderettes been to since coming to China? AM: We’ve toured the Great Wall and been to the Silk Market, and we’ve had to stop for photographs everywhere we’ve been. It’s been a celebrity moment, but we’ve been trying to take pictures of the places we’ve visited, so we feel like tourists more than anything else.

EK: We’ve also been to the Bird’s Nest and seen the Olympic flame. At both the Bird’s Nest and the Silk Market, we’ve run into a number of Paralympians, who we actually wanted our picture taken with.

CW: Overall, what would you say about the trip? AM: Despite the time difference and the short stay of our trip, it has been an exciting experience and everyone we’ve met has been extremely hospitable.

EK: It is definitely something we’d love to come back and do if we ever got the chance. This was such a new experience for every one of us that came to China.

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