I got an opportunity to visit the Olympic Park in Seoul, South Korea where the 1988 Summer Games were held.
Located in the Songpa District just east of the glitzy towers of Gangnam, the park is a massive 1.45 million square meter green space maintained to commemorate the Seoul Games. Stepping off the subway and into the park, one is immediately greeted by two towers with concrete awnings painted with mosaics of red, blue, and white. In the center of the pillars, 5 interlaced rings representing the union of 5 continents stare bolding across the park. And under the pillars, a soft Olympic flame continues to flicker in the spring breeze. While any Olympics monument should commend reverence, I stand in awe of the World Peace Gate monument because it is this park that tells the story of father’s legacy.
My father was born in Shantou, China. At a young age, he was recruited to be a springboard and platform diver. His childhood consisted of living with thousands of other recruited children at a government-run sports school and training full time over 40 hours a week for a chance to represent China on the world stage of athletics. This system is not uncommon in China. Rooted in the Soviet model which saw sports as a way of attracting prestige of the Communist system, the state sends out scouts to hunt for tens of thousands of children in over 3000 government-run sports schools for full-time training. Some schools that stress only sports requiring six hours of training or more a day can be viewed as little more than athlete-producing assembly lines. Many Chinese athletes devote so much of their time to training they can’t read beyond the fifth grade level. Kids as young as four years old have their body type assessed and their limbs poked and prodded in attempts to predict whether they might have elite athlete potential. They are given brutal challenges such as push-ups, pull-ups, flexibility stretches, and endurance running to select for physical strength and talent. Those that are selected are then shipped off to provincial teams, and the best among those are eventually sent to China’s National Training Center in Beijing where they become fully dedicated to their sport. This demanding state sports system was the reality that my father grew up in.
Supposedly only about one in eight of sports school students make it to a provincial team. Of these a third eventually make it to the national team and about a fifth of national team members become Olympians-in-training but only about one in eight of these actually make the cut to the Olympics. This means that for every 900 pre-teens who join the sports school system 899 never make it to the Olympics. My father was the 1 in 900 that did make it to the Olympics and he was the 1 in how ever many to be standing on the Olympic medal podium as a bronze medalist in the 1988 Seoul Games. As I stand in the Olympic Park, 36 years after my father competing in Korea, I am reminded of his years of hard work and sacrifice. My father was one of five kids. Growing up in rural China during the Cultural Revolution, his family had little money for basic necessities and education. Being selected to go to a sports school was a great privilege that would change his trajectory, whether he wanted it at the time or not. I owe everything I have today to my father. He has always been my biggest champion. He has always been the one that encouraged me to face my fears. And he has always been the one to tell me anything is possible if I can dream it. My positive attitude and work ethic is entirely inspired by him and his legacy.
Thank you dad and I love you.
女儿今天早上从韩国汉城给我发的信：
女儿毕业于普林斯顿大学，现在为哈佛商学院学生，
