The 2018 Winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang, South Korea, have brought the world together in athletic competition once again. With Harding students representing 55 nations, there are many sentiments toward the Games on campus.<\/p>\n
Senior Yijun Zhang from China said the Winter Olympics are always a big event. However, he said they are nothing in comparison to the Summer Olympics in China.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor us, the Summer Olympics are very competitive,\u201d Zhang said. \u201cThe Chinese students here never talk about the Winter Olympics, but we do talk a lot about the Summer Olympics when we are in China.\u201d<\/p>\n
Zhang also said there is a sense of national pride that comes with the Olympics in China, similar to that of the U.S.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s like they are competing not just for themselves, but also for our country,\u201d Zhang said.<\/p>\n
While the summer games are more popular in China, sophomore Sasha Regida said the opposite is true in her home country of Russia.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re really excited and proud of each other,\u201d Regida said. \u201cIn Russia, mostly it\u2019s winter sports like hockey, ice skating and figure skating. We\u2019re really strong in that. \u201c<\/p>\n
With athletes banned from competing under the Russian flag this year due to allegations of doping, Regida said the feeling of the Olympics is a little different, but there is no loss of national pride.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s definitely sad, but it doesn\u2019t change anything,\u201d Regida said. \u201cIf a Russian person wins something, it doesn\u2019t change just because we couldn\u2019t use our flag.\u201d<\/p>\n
Charlie Mooney, academic principal of International Christian Schools in Pyeongtaek, South Korea, is experiencing the Games as an American expatriate living in South Korea, just 75 miles from the Olympics. Mooney said there is a distinct difference in attitudes between Americans in South Korea and the Koreans.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Americans are excited, the Koreans are not,\u201d Mooney said. \u201cThere\u2019s not really that patriotic sense of nationalism that I\u2019m hearing from my Korean friends that I\u2019m definitely hearing from my American friends.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mooney also said that the combination of the North and South Korean teams is not creating as much buzz in South Korea as people might think.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverything is a bigger deal to Americans than it is to Koreans,\u201d Mooney said. \u201cNo one talks about North Korea ever, unless an American brings it up. It\u2019s been this way for 60 years, and it\u2019s just another day. But when the American media starts flipping out, it makes the South Koreans nervous that it\u2019ll stir up North Korea.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mooney also observed the skeleton races. He said one thing that stood out to him was the atmosphere of the fans was very congenial and fun once they finally arrived.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone was rooting for their own countries and wearing their flags but it really was in good fun in a globally-minded sort of way,\u201d Mooney said. \u201cI was sincerely impressed by that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Different cultures have different attitudes toward the Olympics. With athletic records being broken and new political precedents being set, Regida said the Olympics can be very powerful.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt unites people,\u201d Regida said. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter where you come from.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 Winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang, South Korea, have brought the world together in athletic competition once again. With Harding students representing 55 nations, there are many sentiments toward…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15102,"featured_media":10418,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10416","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15102"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10416"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10416\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10417,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10416\/revisions\/10417"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}