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ALONG THE WAY: David Dix

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March 7, 2010

By David Dix

Record-Courier Publisher

Want to help U.S. Olympic teams improve?

Click on www.ThankYouMom.com on the Internet. It won't cost you a thing. Each time you do, Proctor & Gamble says it will donate a dollar on your behalf.

I learned that nine days ago during a tour of P&G's "Family Home" for families of U.S. Olympic athletes in Vancouver, the city that hosted the recently concluded Winter Olympics.

To support our athletes and their families, P&G rented out the deluxe conference center of Simon Frazer University in downtown Vancouver. There, P&G provided free meals to families of Olympians, maintained a nursery for youngsters so parents could attend the competition, and hosted a beauty salon for mothers of athletes.

Unlike Olympians of other countries, ours receive no government assistance. To help our athletes, American corporations have come to the rescue with sponsorships. These make the difference, especially for many athletes of modest means whose parents have sacrificed so their children could become Olympic athletes.

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Janet and I had the good fortune to attend the second week of the Winter Olympics. Our first ever Olympics, we had the guidance of our neighbor, Paula Snyder, an assistant superintendent in the Cuyahoga Falls schools.

Paula's an avid sports fan and an expert on figure skating. Janet joined her in Cleveland last winter for the U.S. national figure skating competition and Paula suggested we accompany her to the Olympics this year.

Novices, we completely depended on Paula. Vancouver was her fourth Winter Olympics. She helped us order tickets in advance. She let us join her in sharing accommodations with two colleagues, Michelle Flamer, a Philadelphia lawyer, and Marie Rinaldi, a chemist, who holds patents in the chemistry of cosmetics. Our group rented a home in beautiful Horseshoe Bay, a former fishing village, 40 minutes by bus from downtown Vancouver.

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Vancouver, British Columbia, a bustling international harbor town on the Pacific surrounded by the snowcapped Rockies, is an hour's drive north from the U.S. border and is regularly ranked one of the world's most livable cities.

It's streets are clean and well maintained. The Pacific Current moderates temperatures. Residents boast it is one of the few cities where one can ski in the mountains in the morning, play golf in the afternoon and go sailing later. Its fast-growing metropolitan area numbers 2.3 million residents, 40 percent who have moved there to live. Vancouver adds approximately 6,000 new arrivals a year, many of them from China and India.

Because people spend so much time outdoors, they look unusually healthy. Add to that the presence of hundreds of Olympic athletes from around the world, all young and in peak physical condition. I told Janet I'd never seen so many good-looking human beings assembled in one place. We found ourselves carried along by their exuberance. Vancouver and the Olympics were celebrating, in effect, with a two-week long street party.

Whistler, site of the ski events, is three hours up the mountains and may surpass Colorado's Vail as a ski village. We had no tickets for the skiing events, but spent our first day there and took a gondola ride up Whistler Mountain for a breath-taking view. The rest of the time we stayed in Vancouver and attended skating events.

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We soon tasted Canadian partisanship, although person-to-person the Canadians were friendly, some calling us their American cousins.

Sunday after our arrival, the United States bested Canada in a preliminary hockey match. Hockey is Canada's game and the Vancouver Sun accused the United States of driving a stake into the nation's heart. We were home by last Sunday when the U.S. and Canada played for gold. That sudden death in overtime let the U.S. leave town, heads held high, and salvaged Canadian self-esteem. Final ceremonies might not have been so festive had Canada lost.

At Salt Lake City eight years ago, the U.S. publicly said its goal is to be the best. Canada's slogan in Vancouver was, "Own The Podium." When at first it seemed the U.S. might end up with ownership, Canadian commentators fretted.

At least the Canadians could chalk up their attitude to the pressure of playing host and wanting to make their nation proud. The Russians had no such excuse for their sour grapes over their unusually meager haul of medals.

According to the Vancouver Sun, one high Russian official accused the figure skating competition judges of being in the employ of the CIA. Another dismissed the games and Vancouver's valiant efforts at hosting as "mutton disguised as lamb." Russia's Evgeni Plushenko, who took silver to America's Evan Lysacek's gold, deliberately stepped on the winner's platform reserved for Lysacek because, he said, "I thought I deserved to win."

A Vancouver Sun sports columnist, noting the next Winter Games in four years will take place in Russia, wrote, "I hope they're better hosts than they've been guests."

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If you watched the Olympics on TV, your seats were better than mine, but being there lets one experience the interaction of performers and spectators.

We attended the women's figure skating and those gasps for Korea's Kim Yu-Na were real. She floated across the ice like an angel. Everyone, regardless of nationality, rose to cheer. Canadians pronounced the 19-year-old the greatest female figure skater of all time.

In skate dancing, we also saw Tessa Virtue, 20, and Scott Moir, 22, the Ontario duo whose families struggled financially so they could skate and win gold. They deserved it, but to my uneducated eye others were wonderful, too.

Friday, I accompanied Paula Snyder and her colleagues by gondola up Grouse Mountain to visit the Today Show, which was broadcasting at 4 a.m. because of the time difference.

Working my way forward to watch interviews, the athletes up close mostly looked like very dedicated, good young people, Evan Lysacek, 24, talking about his parents, the skier Julia Mancuso, 26, flirtatious and fun, Rachael Flatt, 17, contemplating college possibly at Stanford in the fall. The French Canadian figure skater, Joannie Rochette, 24, whose mother died of a heart attack just prior to her daughter's bronze medal skating and the only Canadian interviewed, won all hearts.

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Earlier in the week, I peeled off from the ladies to do a walking tour of Chinatown and Gastown, two of Vancouver's interesting neighborhoods. I later took a trolley tour of Vancouver and saw, among many stops, beautiful Stanley Park, one of the largest and oldest municipal parks in the world.

With so many high rise apartments, Vancouver is densely populated and lively. People mix it up, walking or using Vancouver's excellent buses and subways.

Small World Department: Don Schjeldahl of Kent, the industrial site location expert with the Austin Company, was in Vancouver, too. He attended the 5000-meter women's skating race that Janet and I saw at Richmond Stadium, an architectural wonder constructed of wood.

Don was a guest of the Vancouver Economic Development Council, whose members used the Olympics to showcase their city to outside companies. Don said Vancouver is on the cutting edge of the green movement and renewable energy sources. He's made five business trips to Vancouver and calls it the "most beautiful city in North America."

I won't argue that point.




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