The New York Times had a great article yesterday on Kim Yu-Na and the enormous expectations that are on her to win the gold medal in Vancouver.
Given that Kim is a national hero in South Korea, “her loss or her winning will be perceived as a national loss or a national winning,” said Kyung-ae Park, a political scientist who holds the Korea Foundation Chair at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.
“If she wins the gold medal,” Park said, “I think it will be a great boost for national pride for Koreans. In a way, it will work as compensation for past humiliations.”
Adding to the pressure is that the other top competitors for the gold are Japanese. Koreans don’t generally get butterflies in their stomachs with the Japanese… something to do with a small colonization thing in the early 20th century with a little forced labor and prostitution thrown in for good measure.
This the expectations game is one thing I am constantly fascinated with in Korea. There seem to be a lot of expectations on everyone, and a lot of the folks I know seem a little bit stressed out by it. I can’t understand any of this because I come from such a different place. I had expectations from my parents to make good grades and be a good kid, but looking back, it was nothing compared to the kids I see here in Korea.
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Of course, Kim Yu-Na beat everyone’s highest expectations in having the best performances of her life, scoring a 78.50 and breaking her own world record by over two points.
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She was very good and deserved the gold.