National Pride

I have to admit that I was not rooting for Yuna Kim. Not because she wasn’t great, but because so many Korean-Americans were so passionately supporting her. Let me clarify. I have no problem with Koreans living in the US rooting for her. But it doesn’t seem right to me that Koreans born in the US were rooting for her and not the American skaters. I know it’s just a personal problem that I have, but I really dislike when ABCs or ABKs (is that a term?) just think of themselves as Chinese or Korean. You are American too! It’s fine to have national pride for your parents’ home country, but you should have some pride for your home country as well. That’s right, China and Korea are your parents’ home country; the USA is your home country. Anyway, I've gone off on a tangent. Back to figure skating.

Yuna Kim was expected to win. She was under enormous pressure. The weight of her whole country was on her shoulders. She had to win a Gold medal. If she didn’t, she would lose all of her supporters and sponsorships. Okay, I have three issues with that:
1) South Korea had never won a medal in figure skating. Why would Silver or Bronze not be good enough? Why must it be first place or nothing for Asians?
2) Regardless of whether she won Gold, she is an amazing skater. Why would she lose all her sponsorships (see #1)? And even if she lost all of her sponsorships, boohoo, she is a millionaire. She has already made $8 million in endorsements!
3) Even if she became a disappointment to her country (again, see #1), her home may be in Korea, but she lives and trains in Toronto. She could just stay in Canada permanently. I don’t remember the exact statistics, but I think it’s something like 60% of Olympic athletes train in the US or Canada, and about 40% stay here and never return to their home country after the Olympics.

After watching the short program on Tuesday night, Americans Mirai Nagasu and Rachael Flatt were great, but Yuna Kim, Mao Asado, and Joannie Rochette were clearly the best. By the way, why was Yuna Kim called Kim Yu-na, while Mao Asado was called Mao Asado? Isn’t Mao her first name and Asado her last name? Shouldn’t they consistently put last names first for all Asians or just stick with first names first for everyone? Another random question – I wonder if Japanese Americans were rooting for Mao Asado, who is Japanese, or Mirai Nagasu, who is Japanese American. Probably Mao Asado since Asians like to root for winners and not the underdogs. On the same note, I wonder if countries with Olympians that aren’t actually from that country still feel national pride. For example, the ice dancing pair, Chris and Cathy Reed, are American, but competed for Japan. Their sister, Allison, competed for the Georgian team, but has never even been to the country of Georgia before.

Anyway, during the free skate on Thursday night, Yuna Kim’s performance was perfect - technically and artistically. While other skaters slowed down as they approached their jumps to steady themselves, she threw herself into them at full speed, yet touched down with such lightness. Her skating, connecting steps, footwork, and combination spins were beautiful. She was the obvious winner and got a ridiculous score. You could really see that the large weight had been lifted off through her smiles and tears. Mao Asada had to skate next and try to top that. She was close, but then she stumbled on some ice going into a triple and was forced to cut it to a single. It didn’t seem fair, but I guess that’s life. You could tell she wasn’t satisfied with her performance. She didn’t even crack a smile when they announced she was in second place.

Joannie Rochette was next. Her mom died of a heart attack four days before the competition. She decided to go ahead and compete. She was very emotional, but skated passionately, and was truly the picture of courage. Finally, it was Mirai Nagasu’s turn. She was great, but definitely not at the same level as Yuna or Mao. I think she could be a star in 4 years. Although this would be the first time the US didn’t medal since the 1960s, I was glad Mirai didn't surpass Joannie. How could you not root for Joannie? She deserved to medal. Yuna was so cute on the podium. She absolutely deserved to win, and I was definitely happy for her. But I dreaded seeing all of the facebook posts that would say "we won!!!" In the words of Andy during another Olympic event, "WE won?! Who’s WE?! THEY won. WE got second." Go team USA! :-P