June 11, 1999

http://sports.sina.com.cn/others/9906/061115.shtml

I had always wanted a daughter. After my wife was pregnant, I had been wishing a beautiful angel to start her life in our family. I was often trying to outline her naughty face in my mind: when she comes to this world, as a father, I would try my best to dress her up, so that everyone will praise her beauty.

Ten Months of Pregnancy

I never expected that my wife's pregnancy period would be such a hard time for her.

Starting from the day that her pregnancy test showed positive sign, my wife had not felt good. Women usually feel uncomfortable for a few months at the beginning of their pregnancy, but it was the opposite for my wife--she got worse as it was near the time to give birth. When she had been pregnant for six months, it reached the worst. Whatever she ate, it was vomited. Her face was so pale, and I was scared.

I had to take her to the hospital. Everyday she only had fluid intake by needles.

Near the time to give birth, it was already eight months, her condition did not have improvements. The doctors were surprised too. This was a rare case for them. They kindly suggested to us, it might not be a healthy baby, maybe we should consider giving up the child.

After I heard that, I was very sad. Not only this child is an outcome of our loving marriage, but it also took her mother eight months to carry her inside the body. If we give up on her, all those hard times were wasted.

My wife firmly disagreed the suggestion.

We both asked the doctors to try their best to keep our baby.

Everything Is Normal

On June 11, I clearly remembered it was a shiny summer afternoon, at 3:00p.m., I finally heard the first cry from my baby outside the operation room. It was very loud, a clear announcement to the world that she had finally come to join us.

My wish had come true--I got a baby girl.

My wife gave birth to her under normal condition. Her weight was 2.9kg.

I carefully carried her in my arms and looked at her: she has a healthy body and an upright face. She was a completely normal child.

My worries were all gone. I had never felt so relaxed.

By comparing her with other babies, the only difference was she had very white and smooth skin. It was not like an "old and wrinkled" face as other babies. All the doctors and nurses said: "she's a beautiful baby." When Sang Lan was only one month old, she started all the "activities." She started walking, tumbling and climbing earlier than other babies.

When she was about eight months old, I was writing on my desk one day. I felt a little hand grabbing my leg. It was my daughter. How did she get off her baby bed and came to me?

I was stunned!

That was very surprising, my daughter learned walking all by herself!

She was only quiet in sleep. She had long lashes, white skin, and healthy red lips. Her face looked like a peach.

Taking Gymnastics

When Sang Lan was five years old, she brought a notice from kindergarten one day. It said the amateur sports school in Ningbo (the city) was going to have a gymnastics class for the kids. Any children who like to attend could register for the class.

I asked Sang Lan's mother, should we let her to try. She was an active girl, maybe gymnastics could help her to train a healthy and beautiful body.

Sang Lan herself kept yelling too: "I want to take gymnastics, I love gymnastics." We took her to the test.

Out of many children there, Sang Lan passed two rigorous levels in the test. She was chosen by the coach.

Sang Lan's fate, has then been correlated with gymnastics.

Temper

My daughter was a behaved child. Whenever I saw her smile, all the worries disappeared.

Sang Lan was very active. She didn't like to stay home alone. Even at lunchtime, her aunt had to take her to the park to eat her meal.

We knew more about her straight but stubborn temper after she started gymnastics.

The Ningbo Youth Sports School was far from our house. Sang Lan and I had to get up at 5a.m. every morning. I then took her on my bike to the training. It had been for a few years. It was not that easy!

In a winter morning at 5, it was dark, mixing rain and ice outdoors. That was the coolest weather in southern China.

I opened the blanket and it was very cold. I wanted to go back to sleep. I didn't want to go to the training that day. But my daughter kept bothering me, she insisted me to take her to the school. I then tried to convince her: "Good girl. It is too cold today, and the road is slippery. Let's skip it for just a day. It's not going to make a difference. I will ask the coach to make up the time later." But she didn't stop requesting me. Finally she used her weapon--she started crying!

I could not refuse her. We then walked with our bike in the snow rain.

During her days at the amateur school, Sang Lan requested to be the first one getting into the gym every day. She was no later than anyone else, and she was always the last one to leave. No matter if it was her turn or not, she was always willing to clean the gym.

Many kids who passed the initial test with Sang Lan gradually disappeared from the training, but Sang Lan's performance was always the best according to her coaches. She was like climbing steps--smoothly advanced from the juniors to higher levels.

Her teachers said she never cried when doing leaps. She was always a disciplined child, and she never got scared of new elements.

Sang Lan has a keen feeling for gymnastics. She loves gymnastics.

Only for a year, the six-year old Sang Lan brought one gold and two silver medals home from the provincial competition for juniors. It was a benchmark in her gymnastics career. A good talent can never escape the eyes of the coaches. The eight-year old Sang Lan moved from Ningbo to Hangzhou and joined the professional gymnastics team of the province.

When the grass turned green in spring, the nine-year old Sang Lan surprised us by winning all five golds in the Provincial Games juniors section.

Our efforts were worth it!

Likes Red

Before she was born, I as the father promised that I would dress her up, and let her be the most beautiful girl in the world. But since she practiced gymnastics, she got up early and slept late for her training. She didn't have any time to dress up.

When she won golds and came home, I thought of my promise and decided to dress up our little princess.

My wife and I took Sang Lan to the most flouring street, we went to each shop on the street. At the end we were all looking a red cloth. Sang Lan looked into mirror on herself, it was very pretty. She wore it home and was jumping for all day. It was like a firework.

Afterwards, my daughter has more and more red stuff--red skirts, red scarves, red sweaters... She likes red, she looks for an enthusiastic life. She hopes one day she could have the five-star flag raising on her competition field.

Likes Snacks

Most girls like snacks. This is not a big problem. But for a gymnast, it is a big problem because they have to control their weight. Sang Lan never cares. If you don't let her have snacks, it would be worse than beating her. She likes anything made by shan zha (a fruit). When she was injured in New York, she still asked her friends to bring her shan zha snacks. It's never enough.

Sang Lan said she "has big mouth to eat everywhere" (a proverb in Chinese, means persons with big mouth are easier to live at any place). She keeps eating snacks but she never gains weight. It's really fortunate to her. She was short and light. I never heard any complaints from her coaches about her weight.

After she becomes paralyzed, she always needs someone to carry her. If we are not strong enough to do that, she feels guilty. It's good that she's very light. We're all giants compare to her, and she found console and courage from our arms.

Our Family at Ningbo

When Sang Lan was injured, the news was like a bomb to our family. Her 79-year old grandmother and 83-year old grandfather were all crying hard.

Thousands of miles away, they could not see their granddaughter, they could not even talk to her. When they were sad, they always prayed Sang Lan would become healthy soon.

Luckily, Sang Lan met kind people in USA. Her guardian Xie Xiao Hong and her family all treat her as their daughter, and the two boys treat her like real sister. This is the most fortunate out of the unfortunate for Sang Lan!

Sang Lan's body gets better and better now and her condition becomes stable. For our convenience, the municipal government exchanged our apartment on the seventh floor to another bigger apartment on the first floor.

It's unfortunate for Sang Lan. But since she got injured, love has been surrounding her. Although Sang Lan is our daughter, but we are not the only people care about her. If we all devote love to others, this would be a better world.

Let's devote our true love to this world!

(end)

(Interview taken in 1999)

http://www.chinasports.com/mx136.htm

At first, Mo Hui Lan is more of a star than a classmate to us. After we get to know her, she's no different than a normal student at Ren Min University (Ren Min means people).

"Love" Da Guo Cai

(Da Guo Cai means the large scale production of food, mainly refers to the food at cafeteria)

Lan Lan confessed that she was not used to the food here at first. More than once she "complains" to us: before she looked forward to the free life outside gymnastics, now she's living independently, and she starts to cherish the gymnastics life before where she was taken care of by others. After she came here, she was not used to the taste of Da Guo Cai in cafeteria, she then went other places where she could have combo meals. Since we get to know her well very soon, we started to "teach her the lesson." Once, we "dragged" her from the second floor back to the café, and "gave her the orders" that she much each Da Guo Cai with everyone. We thought that she wouldn't keep this joke in mind, but since then this girl tried to eat Da Guo Cai with us. She can even remember the names and the prices. Eating with us in the cafeteria becomes one of Lan Lan's delights.

Living alone in the research students' building, Lan Lan was first not used to take care of herself. To avoid going to the washroom through the dark stairway at night, in a long time she tried to drink very little water in the evening. Every time when the dorm settled down, the noise of the little bugs' chewing of wood became clear, Lan Lan was always very afraid that she used cotton to cover her ears. She got a cold just a few days the school started, she went to see the doctor herself. She no longer complained to us, she starts to confront with the transition from brilliance to a normal life journey.

Telephone Bills As Much As Tuition Fees

The lively Lan Lan also has time of being quiet. Her eyes glitter when she is sitting before the window where she is pondering. "What are you thinking? Lan Lan?" "Will I be a good sports journalist?" "Why not? You had a lot of experience, you would have no problem." Every time we say this to her, she always shakes her head with her tongue coming out of her mouth, and gives us a funny gimace, then she goes back to study. We always receive phone from Lan Lan, 90% of them are all types of questions about how to understand and tackle problems. We always joke that Lan Lan's phone bills are used as tuition fees. She knows very well that most of her life has been spent on gymnastics training instead of learning. She always studies very hard and tries to catch up the pace in university. To improve her English level, Lan Lan asked two teachers from the sports school to tutor her.

"Before my time was all dedicated to gymnastics, now I have to get back all the learning time that I've missed." She shows her tough side.

"Wow, I would never do this!"

Lan Lan is a lively and straightforward girl, but she also has her sympathetic side. Every time she sees homeless people, she always gives them her changes. Normally she receives a lot of fan letters from all over the country, sometimes she got more than a dozen in a day. No matter how busy she is, she always reads every letter thoroughly, and she keeps every letter. She replies to every letter. When people ask for her picture with autograph from the letters, she always satisfies them.

After she got into university, she cares about her ability to work in real life. She joins many voluntary services and does volunteer work.

After living eight years in Beijing, Lan Lan doesn't seem to lose her affection to her family. She often writes letters and make phone calls to he parents. Her picture with her sister on the desk has stayed along with her for many nights of studying--the pair of twin sisters were smiling side by side. Lan Lan always feels vary sad that her sister, Mo Hui Fang, had to stop training because of injuries.

Lan Lan feels a lot of pressure from studies, but she still maintains her peaceful and optimistic view to look at everything in life. She's still a lively and naughty girl. Many of her appliances have her favorite figure, the Micky Mouse. She herself looks like a big doll sometimes, always with snacks in her hands, always with many strange ornaments on her body. We have classes together, we rest together, and we eat together. We often play with each other like good friends. Every time after we play a prank to her, she mocks looking at us innocently, and yells: "Wow, I would never do this!" She always stays in our bed and doesn't want to leave, she asks us to read her story like a child.

This is the Mo Hui Lan in our eyes, we will stay with her for four years.

(end)

February 22, 1999

Chinese Sports Newspaper

http://www.sport.gov.cn/paper/tyb/index.html

The Olympic Champion Seven Years Ago Is Graduating from University This Year

At the grand opening ceremony of the computerized sports lottery in the Hunan province, I had the chance to meet the Barcelona Olympic champion Lu Li.

Lu Li is now a fourth year student studying international culture and media at the University of Beijing. She came back to her home province Hunan to spend her New Year's holidays. Compared to the tiny little girl in 1992, today's Lu Li looks more matured. She is still very thin though, with forefront look: short hair of dark brown color, with little earrings, wearing skirt and boots—I could not recognize her at first glance.

"At school, many students were not sure too. They mumbled: this girls looks very much like Lu Li!" Lu Li laughed, "they don't know that I'm at university now, especially at the Beijing University." (Beijing University is generally considered as one of the most prestigious universities in China by most Chinese.) She chose to retire and start education at the peak of her gymnastics career, but the life of university is filled with equal challenge to her. Lu Li's main difficulty is English, she started with learning the alphabets, and her profession has strict standards of ability in English. She honestly confessed: "My English is only in the second level now."

Near her graduation, Lu Li is applying for studying aboard. She revealed: "It's related to gymnastics."

Lu Li has left the competition field for six years, but she still maintains a gymnastics body. I asked her if she was still taking training, she denied: "It's hard for me to gain weight."

But she could not forget gymnastics. She rarely misses watching any competition, and she still keeps contact with many younger members on the national team. After Sang Lan's injury, she was sad for quite a while. She asked the girls on the team to take her greeting to the little unfortunate girl.

Being a famous gymnast, Lu Li joined the World University Games in Italy in 1997 as an athlete at the opening ceremony. Due to her "bright history," she was elected to be a cadre member in the Students' Sports Club at her university.

Most of the time, Lu Li lives quietly as a normal university student, and she likes the peace, "I'm completely converted from being an athlete to a student." I said: "But you still look very young." Lu Li answered: "No, I'm already 21, I'm an adult now." She wants to be grown up.

But the folks in her province Hunan still treat her as the "little vigor." Wherever Lu Li appeared, the crowds would get excited. Some people tapped her head, and happily said: "You're taller, you're taller…" Many people took picture with her, and intimately called her "Li Li", that was her little name many years ago. In people's eye, Lu Li is still a cute little girl. She is very attached to the folks in her home town—in 1992, when the fifteen year old Lu Li became the champion, the neighbors of the Lu's family went to the street and set off fire crackers, the red paper were everywhere on the street.

(end)