While the Chinese cuisine enjoys worldwide fame, the food service at the press centers and in the media village has unfortunately fallen short of many reporters' expectations.

"The Chinese food I had at the MPC were greasy and expensive, and I'm a little disappointed that traditional Chinese foods like the hot-pots are missing here," Magnay said.

"Part of the experience to cover the Olympics in a foreign country is to experience the culture and the food. The problem is they tried to be too western, while they should just do what they do well," said the Australian.

South Korean reporter Cho Joon Hyung also regretted the absence of Korean food, while Brazil's Pereira wanted more food varieties.

Managers of the press camps said they are working with the American catering company responsible for the Olympic food service to collect responses, and are planning changes to the menus.

Though fully aware of the necessity of foolproof security for the upcoming Games, which already received terrorist threats, some reporters still found the strict security checks a source of inconvenience and even discomfort.

Polish TV's Robert Gbralczyk said he was annoyed when being approached by security guards or policemen when he was doing interviews in public places. Magnay, the Australian, said she felt "funny and strange" when she was asked to use her lip gloss to prove it's nothing poisonous.

Sources with the Games' security division said they will reexamine the check procedures and cancel those found unnecessary, but will have to keep on high alert as security is still a top priority.

On Monday, reporters who departed from the Green Homeland media village in north Beijing for the MPC were no longer required to turn on and off their laptops while passing the checkpoint, if they agreed to put the computer in a separate basket to go through the X-ray.

Zhao Huizhi, chief of the Huiyuan media village, east of the Bird's Nest, brings with her a notebook to jot down problems and complaints to be addressed.

"If the requests are reasonable, we will try our best to see to them," she said. "We are getting into the Olympic pace, and we want our work to get better day by day."