Post by tenniscraze on Aug 22, 2008 3:58:38 GMT -5
I highlighted the funny parts in bold. Also interesting to note that Li Na, pro tennis player, talks about her greatness.
www.nytimes.com/2008/08/22/sports/olympics/22coach.html?pagewanted=all
August 22, 2008
Coach Finds That She Can Go Home Again
By JULIET MACUR
BEIJING — Lang Ping, the coach of the United States women’s volleyball team, tries to be a master of disguise in her home city.
She hides behind sunglasses or pulls on a floppy hat. With her team, she often exits arenas at the center of a huddle, sometimes escorted by bodyguards as people clamor to get a glimpse of her or touch the sleeve of her shirt.
A former Chinese national team volleyball star, she once wrapped all but her eyes with a scarf so she would not be recognized on a bike ride. As she pedaled down the streets of Beijing, Lang saw people point to her and cry out: “Lang Ping! Look everybody, that’s Lang Ping under that scarf!”
“I can’t go out at all or do anything in public because I’m mobbed by my fans,” she said. “Once I bought something from a street vendor and everyone pointed to me: ‘Look, Lang Ping eat that! Take photo of Lang Ping eating that!’ Ugh, I say. Too much.”
On Saturday, the 47-year-old Lang — who goes by her chosen name of Jenny in the United States — will have no place to hide. The United States team she coaches will take on Brazil for the gold medal. It will be the first appearance of the United States women in an Olympic gold medal match since 1984.
China will play Cuba for the bronze medal, an awkward ending to Olympic women’s volleyball for some Chinese.
Since the Olympics began, Chinese newspaper editorials, stories and blogs have discussed Lang’s success. One newspaper story’s headline read, “Let’s Be Proud of Lang Ping,” urging people not to consider her a traitor. Others said she had forsaken her homeland.
“She should not have turned her back on China to coach the opponents,” said Yang Lijia, 47, a fan at the United States-Cuba match on Thursday. “I am proud that she is Chinese, but if she coached for China, we would be going for the gold medal. It’s too bad about this.”
Cui Dalin, the vice minister of the General Administration of Sport of China, said that the Chinese sports officials were honored that Lang was chosen to coach the Americans.
“We feel happy for her,” Cui said in an interview this spring at the Chinese Olympic Committee’s headquarters. “America’s volleyball team will be the most popular team in Beijing because of Lang Ping.”
Lang insists she made the right move by taking the job in 2005. Because volleyball is not as popular in the United States as it is in China, she said, she could have a normal life as the U.S. coach, living near the United States Olympic Committee’s training center in Colorado Springs, Colo.
“I will always be Chinese, even though I wear another country’s colors,” she said. “My fans love me, so I hope they understand that.”
Lang, who is nearly 6 feet 2 inches, was nicknamed Iron Hammer during her playing career because of her powerful spikes. At the 1996 Olympics, she coached the Chinese women’s team to a silver medal.
In the late 1970s and ’80s, she was the leader of a team that won four world championships and the gold medal at the 1984 Games.
In the 1980s, after the world watched Lady Diana Spencer marry Prince Charles, China watched Lang Ping marry Bai Feng, a national team handball player, in a wedding broadcast on national television. Later, her face was on postage stamps. Stadiums were named after her.
“In China, people will remember me forever because of what I represented to the country,” Lang said. “But I needed something else. I didn’t want to stay in my house for the rest of my life, hiding.”
In search of normalcy, Lang coached and studied English at the University of New Mexico before returning to China to coach. She then coached in Italy before accepting her current job.
Her American players were unaware of their new coach’s fame until they took a trip to China in 2005. Lang’s photo was on a huge billboard inside the arena where they played. A group of Chinese fans waved an American flag and chanted Lang’s name.
“Mothers have thrown their children at her,” the United States volleyball player Nicole Davis said. “I don’t think there’s any parallel to that in the U.S. Not Michael Jordan. Not anything.
“She is more of a historical figure, more of a sports figure. I mean, she’s in the history books. I think that’s a beautiful thing.”
Lang’s father was a policeman in Beijing; her mother was a manager in a hotel. They wanted her to be a doctor, but her athleticism got in the way. Life then was much harder than the Chinese players have it today, she said. Lang said she slept on a wooden plank. She had just three sets of clothes.
“There was nothing to be happy about or not,” she said of life under Mao Zedong. “Life was very simple and all persons were made to be the same.”
In the late 1970s, athletes began venturing outside China for competitions and became ambassadors for their country. But they were not given much freedom, told by their federation exactly what to do and how to do it. They often remained in their hotel rooms, never given any money with which to explore on their own.
“It was a huge deal for us to travel, and we were really careful about everything we did because we were so scared people would just grab us and maybe take us away,” she said. Lang said the team remained on its best behavior. Everything they said had to be positive. Every action was watched and judged, they were told, by every non-Chinese.
“We were trained like that to talk the same, act in a certain way,” she said. “Our mind was less open then.”
Lang received televisions or bikes for good performances, but never money, she said. Six years in a row, she was voted the best athlete in China and received the same bike each year.
Now, China’s best athletes receive cars, apartments and cash. They often travel with laptops and cellphones.
“If it wasn’t for Lang Ping, none of us would enjoy the kind of life we have,” said the Chinese tennis player Li Na, known for her shopping sprees on the road.
Lang said she could see China changing each time the team returned home. People started to dress more as individuals, even going to the hair salon for perms.
“Life had been changing little by little,” she said. “And we were the earliest to taste it and bring it home with us.”
Lang now living alone in Colorado, sometimes highlights her hair and paints her nails light blue.
She is divorced and her daughter, Lydia Bai, 16, a member of the junior national volleyball team, lives in Orange County, Calif. Now, the only people who stop her on the street are from China, she said. She is glad to be back in Beijing, a star coach on a campaign for a gold medal. Her country of origin does not seem to mind, except for one caveat.
“If we are not playing China, the Chinese fans always cheer for us,” Davis said. “It’s not bad to suddenly have a billion people on your side.”
www.nytimes.com/2008/08/22/sports/olympics/22coach.html?pagewanted=all
August 22, 2008
Coach Finds That She Can Go Home Again
By JULIET MACUR
BEIJING — Lang Ping, the coach of the United States women’s volleyball team, tries to be a master of disguise in her home city.
She hides behind sunglasses or pulls on a floppy hat. With her team, she often exits arenas at the center of a huddle, sometimes escorted by bodyguards as people clamor to get a glimpse of her or touch the sleeve of her shirt.
A former Chinese national team volleyball star, she once wrapped all but her eyes with a scarf so she would not be recognized on a bike ride. As she pedaled down the streets of Beijing, Lang saw people point to her and cry out: “Lang Ping! Look everybody, that’s Lang Ping under that scarf!”
“I can’t go out at all or do anything in public because I’m mobbed by my fans,” she said. “Once I bought something from a street vendor and everyone pointed to me: ‘Look, Lang Ping eat that! Take photo of Lang Ping eating that!’ Ugh, I say. Too much.”
On Saturday, the 47-year-old Lang — who goes by her chosen name of Jenny in the United States — will have no place to hide. The United States team she coaches will take on Brazil for the gold medal. It will be the first appearance of the United States women in an Olympic gold medal match since 1984.
China will play Cuba for the bronze medal, an awkward ending to Olympic women’s volleyball for some Chinese.
Since the Olympics began, Chinese newspaper editorials, stories and blogs have discussed Lang’s success. One newspaper story’s headline read, “Let’s Be Proud of Lang Ping,” urging people not to consider her a traitor. Others said she had forsaken her homeland.
“She should not have turned her back on China to coach the opponents,” said Yang Lijia, 47, a fan at the United States-Cuba match on Thursday. “I am proud that she is Chinese, but if she coached for China, we would be going for the gold medal. It’s too bad about this.”
Cui Dalin, the vice minister of the General Administration of Sport of China, said that the Chinese sports officials were honored that Lang was chosen to coach the Americans.
“We feel happy for her,” Cui said in an interview this spring at the Chinese Olympic Committee’s headquarters. “America’s volleyball team will be the most popular team in Beijing because of Lang Ping.”
Lang insists she made the right move by taking the job in 2005. Because volleyball is not as popular in the United States as it is in China, she said, she could have a normal life as the U.S. coach, living near the United States Olympic Committee’s training center in Colorado Springs, Colo.
“I will always be Chinese, even though I wear another country’s colors,” she said. “My fans love me, so I hope they understand that.”
Lang, who is nearly 6 feet 2 inches, was nicknamed Iron Hammer during her playing career because of her powerful spikes. At the 1996 Olympics, she coached the Chinese women’s team to a silver medal.
In the late 1970s and ’80s, she was the leader of a team that won four world championships and the gold medal at the 1984 Games.
In the 1980s, after the world watched Lady Diana Spencer marry Prince Charles, China watched Lang Ping marry Bai Feng, a national team handball player, in a wedding broadcast on national television. Later, her face was on postage stamps. Stadiums were named after her.
“In China, people will remember me forever because of what I represented to the country,” Lang said. “But I needed something else. I didn’t want to stay in my house for the rest of my life, hiding.”
In search of normalcy, Lang coached and studied English at the University of New Mexico before returning to China to coach. She then coached in Italy before accepting her current job.
Her American players were unaware of their new coach’s fame until they took a trip to China in 2005. Lang’s photo was on a huge billboard inside the arena where they played. A group of Chinese fans waved an American flag and chanted Lang’s name.
“Mothers have thrown their children at her,” the United States volleyball player Nicole Davis said. “I don’t think there’s any parallel to that in the U.S. Not Michael Jordan. Not anything.
“She is more of a historical figure, more of a sports figure. I mean, she’s in the history books. I think that’s a beautiful thing.”
Lang’s father was a policeman in Beijing; her mother was a manager in a hotel. They wanted her to be a doctor, but her athleticism got in the way. Life then was much harder than the Chinese players have it today, she said. Lang said she slept on a wooden plank. She had just three sets of clothes.
“There was nothing to be happy about or not,” she said of life under Mao Zedong. “Life was very simple and all persons were made to be the same.”
In the late 1970s, athletes began venturing outside China for competitions and became ambassadors for their country. But they were not given much freedom, told by their federation exactly what to do and how to do it. They often remained in their hotel rooms, never given any money with which to explore on their own.
“It was a huge deal for us to travel, and we were really careful about everything we did because we were so scared people would just grab us and maybe take us away,” she said. Lang said the team remained on its best behavior. Everything they said had to be positive. Every action was watched and judged, they were told, by every non-Chinese.
“We were trained like that to talk the same, act in a certain way,” she said. “Our mind was less open then.”
Lang received televisions or bikes for good performances, but never money, she said. Six years in a row, she was voted the best athlete in China and received the same bike each year.
Now, China’s best athletes receive cars, apartments and cash. They often travel with laptops and cellphones.
“If it wasn’t for Lang Ping, none of us would enjoy the kind of life we have,” said the Chinese tennis player Li Na, known for her shopping sprees on the road.
Lang said she could see China changing each time the team returned home. People started to dress more as individuals, even going to the hair salon for perms.
“Life had been changing little by little,” she said. “And we were the earliest to taste it and bring it home with us.”
Lang now living alone in Colorado, sometimes highlights her hair and paints her nails light blue.
She is divorced and her daughter, Lydia Bai, 16, a member of the junior national volleyball team, lives in Orange County, Calif. Now, the only people who stop her on the street are from China, she said. She is glad to be back in Beijing, a star coach on a campaign for a gold medal. Her country of origin does not seem to mind, except for one caveat.
“If we are not playing China, the Chinese fans always cheer for us,” Davis said. “It’s not bad to suddenly have a billion people on your side.”
