BEIJING - The Olympics are two weeks away, but athletes are already arriving in Beijing.

The Athletes Village, a sprawling complex of high-rise apartments that will lodge 16,000 athletes and officials, formally opens Sunday.

"We want the village to be a cozy place that makes athletes feel like they are coming home," said Deng Yaping, an Olympic table-tennis gold medalist and deputy director of the Olympic Village Department of the Beijing Organizing Committee.

Deng said 35 of the 205 delegations already had some representation in the village.

The village will contain a restaurant that can feed 5,000 people, teahouses, a barbershop, post office, its own fire station, shopping areas, library, a clinic, and coffee shops. Western and Asian cuisine will be available 24 hours a day.

Village restaurants will serve traditional Beijing dishes such as Peking Duck, Chinese-style porridge and hand-shaved noodles.

"Athletes can also request their favorite dishes they're craving from home and we will try our best to accommodate them," Deng said.

Located about a 25-minute walk northwest of the two centerpiece venues for the games _ the Bird's Nest stadium and swimming's Water Cube _ high-rise apartments in the 66-hectare (163-acre) complex will be sold after the games for US$500,000-US$1 million each.

In November, China denied allegations of religious intolerance when media reports surfaced that Bibles would be banned during the games. Since then, organizers have announced that 10,000 copies of the Bible will be distributed in places of worship throughout the Athletes Village.