Apart from Chinese athletes, I most want to see her in the Olympic Games.
The ultimate goal of modern Olympism is to make sports serve the harmonious development of mankind and to promote and establish a peaceful society that maintains human dignity.
if you watch the opening ceremony of the Rio Olympic Games, I wonder if you have noticed the refugee delegation set up for the first time this year.
I don't know if you noticed the little girl in the line holding a small flag and smiling at the camera.
she is the Yusra Martini (Yusra Mardini), an 18-year-old Syrian girl I wrote about earlier. She participated in the 200m freestyle event at this Olympic Games.
this is a group photo of the refugee Olympic team in Rio.
for most athletes, one of the motivations for participating in the Olympic Games must be to see their country's national flag raised on the field and hear their country's national anthem played in the ears of people all over the world.
but these athletes are different. either because of the war, because of persecution, or for other reasons, they are forced to leave their country and become stateless and stateless refugees.
to enable them to participate in the Olympic Games, for the first time in the history of the IOC, they are allowed to form a team to compete as a "refugee team".
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because they do not belong to any country in the legal sense, they do not have a national flag or national anthem. If they win a medal, the Olympic flag will be raised and the Olympic anthem will be played.
Martini is a refugee who was born in Damascus, Syria, and now lives in a refugee camp in Germany.
only a year ago, her boat nearly drowned in the Mediterranean Sea. As a swimmer, she not only survived but also saved the lives of nearly 20 other Syrian stowaways in the same boat. After that narrow escape, she said she was afraid of the sea.
from the vast and frightening Mediterranean Sea to the calm short pool of the Olympic Games, Martini swam along an amazing dream road.
Martini grew up in Syria and was once a key swimmer trained by the Syrian Olympic Committee. It was her dream to participate in the Olympic Games since she was a child.
however, with the outbreak of the civil war in Syria, the war has lasted for several years, ordinary people can not even guarantee their basic life and personal safety, and normal training has become extravagant hope-sometimes swimming in the swimming pool. A bomb exploded in the pool.
Last August, Martini and her sister, like millions of their Syrian compatriots, began to flee. The route they chose to enter Europe was to flee to neighboring Lebanon and then trek across Turkey to Greece by boat from Turkey's westernmost port city of Izmir (Izmir).
in Izmir, the first smuggling of the two sisters was intercepted by the Turkish coast police. A few days later, they went out to sea again under the cover of night. This time, the rubber dinghy they were in soon got into the water and was about to sink.
of the more than 20 people on board at that time, only the two sisters and another girl could swim. Martini thought, "if I drown in the sea, it would be a shame for me because I am a swimmer."
so the three girls jumped into the water, holding the dinghy in one hand and paddling desperately with the other. After rowing for two hours, we dragged a boatload of people to Greece on the other side of the Aegean Sea and landed at (Lesbos) on the island of Lesbos.
after arriving in Greece, Martini and her sister walked on land for another seven days, passed through Macedonia and Serbia, and finally entered Hungary.
in Hungary, the money and clothes left after they bought the tickets were stolen. On the train, the border police came to drive them away and threatened them with guns. Facing the gun, Martini smiled. The policeman asked her curiously what she was laughing at, and she said, "because I've already died once in the sea, I'm not afraid of you at all, and nothing can scare me."
after going through a lot of hardships, the two sisters finally reached Germany through Hungary. They went first to Munich and then to Berlin. By this time, a full 35 days had passed since they left their home in Syria.
in a refugee camp in Berlin, Martini met an Egyptian translator. When he learned that Martini had learned to swim, he introduced her to a swimming club called Wasserfreunde Spandau 04. Sven Spannekrebs, the club's coach, noticed that although she jumped into the water with a touch of shyness, she was a little out of shape because she had not trained for a long time, but could see that she had some potential, so he persuaded her to stay and train.
Martini originally wanted to compete in the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, but after months of painstaking training, her performance has been greatly improved, from 2 minutes 11 seconds to 2 minutes 03 seconds. This result has made her qualified for the Rio Olympic Games.
the coach said: "A lot of people take Martini as a role model." She is very focused, has clear goals, and has strong control over her life. "
in an interview with the media, Martini said, "it's very painful to leave my country, but what makes me feel a little better is that there are millions of people who have been through it with me, and we encourage and support each other." It is my dream to participate in the Olympic Games, and I hope I can inspire all the displaced people like me to make them proud of me. "
the refugee delegation has a total of 10 members, several of whom are introduced.
this is Rami Anis,25, who is also Syrian. He became one of Syria's top swimmers five years ago, fled to Turkey because he didn't want to be conscripted and his fellow Syrians killed each other, and finally settled in Belgium. He will compete in the 100-meter freestyle and 100-meter butterfly.
Yonas Kinde, born in Ethiopia, traveled to Luxembourg in 2013 to apply for refugee status to escape the war. In Luxembourg, the 36-year-old earned his living by driving a taxi while insisting on his training and finally qualified for the Rio Olympic Games.
Popole Misenga,23, born in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was separated from his family because of the war at the age of 9. He hid in the forest for eight days before he was rescued and sent to the children's rescue station. It was there that he came into contact with taekwondo and has loved the sport ever since.
in 2013, when he represented the Congolese national team to Brazil for the World Judo Championships, the coach sneaked away and took away all his identity documents and belongings, leaving him on the street and desperate to apply for refugee status in Brazil.
Paulo Amotun Lokoro,24, a herdsman in South Sudan a few years ago, knows nothing about the outside world. His country has been at war for as long as he can remember, and he had to flee to neighboring Kenya a few years ago. In a refugee camp in Nairobi, he showed an amazing talent for long-distance running and became a 1500-meter runner.
as stated in the Olympic Charter, the ultimate goal of modern Olympism is to make sports serve the harmonious development of mankind and to promote and build a peaceful society that upholds human dignity.
what is safeguarding human dignity? To allow everyone qualified to participate in the competition, not to let war and political reasons shatter their dreams, is to safeguard human dignity.