MANILA, Philippines—For most of us the Olympic Games in Beijing provides a much-needed respite from the imbroglio of politics in our country. Like millions around the world, I kept track of Michael Phelps, the 23-year-old swimming sensation from Baltimore, Maryland, as he secured his fifth gold medal in the fabulous "Water Cube" in Beijing. Phelps has set out to better the 36-year-old record scored by another US swimming champ from another era, Mark Spitz, who accumulated nine gold medals, seven of them in one Olympics. Last Tuesday Phelps already evened Spitz's record after he bagged his third gold in Beijing. He is now only two golds away from Spitz's single Olympic record and three golds away from his own target of eight. Keeping him going these past days, aside from Olympic immortality, is the fact that his sponsor, Speedo, is giving him a $1-million bonus after he has overtaken Spitz's feat.
Perhaps lost in the magnificent performance of Phelps was something just as sensational: the incredible teamwork of the US freestyle relay team that enabled him to keep going after this goal. One lesson from this event, as our nation is caught up in the hysteria over how to handle the MILF and the peace process, is the supervening role of teamwork especially in nation-building.
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The US team bagged the gold medal in the men's 400-meter freestyle relay last Monday by 0.08 seconds when the 32-year-old Jason Lezak, the oldest in the US team, beat Alain Bernard of France in the closing leg. It was sweet revenge for the US team because Bernard, the holder of the world record in the 100-meter freestyle, had earlier predicted that the French team would "smash" the Americans in the relay. Instead, "ancient" Lezak swam the closing leg in 46.06 seconds (versus the Frenchman's 46.73 seconds), considered the fasted such leg in history. Phelps, who swam the first leg, was moved to call it "phenomenal."
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Lezak's victory preserved Phelps quest for eight golds in Beijing. As the Herald Tribune's Karen Crouse put it, the US team couldn't allow Phelps' bid to "dissolve" in a pool. Lezak, swimming the anchor leg, hit the water a half-second after Bernard, and he was quoted as saying later, "I knew I was going to have to swim out of my mind." He made up ground, but with just 25 meters remaining it appeared as if he would "run out of pool" as he trailed Bernard by half a body length. But the Southern Californian and three-time Olympian, who had been through this predicament before, "put his head down and surged to the wall." The giant scoreboard showed he had out-touched Bernard by 0.08 seconds. Another sports writer, George Vecsey, quoted Lezak as saying that in that 5-second span, "he had talked himself into believing that he could catch Bernard" and his three teammates "could only watch from the edge, part of a unit, like great tennis players who discover the joy of team unity in Davis Cup play." At that point, wrote Vecsey, Phelps the superstar of the Beijing Olympics, "became a fan, a cheerleader, a teammate."
What Lezak achieved, according to Crouse, was to keep Phelps's pursuit of Mark Spitz's record of eight (gold medals) in one Olympics "alive, with a little help from his mates." Had the US relay team faltered, Phelps wouldn't have that chance. Why do I belabor this event? I think it's illustrative of the need for teamwork and rising above petty jealousies, the superstar mentality and other bad tendencies that destroy esprit de corps—be it working for gold medals or building a nation. It also shows what fighting spirit can do to achieve one's goals.
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Earlier I wrote about a CNN feature that showed how young Chinese children, some of them virtual babies, were being subjected to punishing body stretching as some of them wept possibly from pain, exhaustion and fright. I wrote that as I watched, I felt a mixture of awe and fright at the kind of discipline China subjects its people to in order to turn them into world-class athletes. Yesterday I watched with the same mixture of awe and fright another feature showing some very young Chinese, perhaps 10 or 12 years old, attack the game of table tennis with the ferocity of lions. The American commentator pointed out that these young people are going to give up everything perhaps for the next decade, in order to be trained for international competition. I realize that if a country wants world-class athletes—or singers or whatever profession for that matter—this is the way to do it. But when I think that such people won't have any more freedom or even the luxury of being young once, I realize it's frightening.
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Next Thursday, Aug. 21, the nation celebrates the 25th anniversary of the martyrdom of Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino. Two organizations, the Spirit of EDSA and the EDSA People Power Commission, have organized an elaborate program spanning days to celebrate the momentous occasion when a brave Filipino chose to come back from the safety and comfort of foreign exile to confront the Marcos dictatorship, even if the possibility of his being killed was so great. The public events to mark the 25th anniversary of Ninoy's martyrdom will include a wreath-laying at the airport tarmac, visits to his grave at the Manila Memorial Park, an essay contest sponsored by the National Commission on Culture and the Arts and a slew of TV and radio programs.
This Thursday night at 9, catch visiting Timor Leste President Jose Ramos Horta on the TV talk show, "Equilibrium," on Channel 4, hosted by former secretary of environment and natural resources Heherson Alvarez. The freedom fighter and Nobel laureate met with Ninoy and Alvarez in the US where the latter were living in exile during the later years of the Marcos regime. Ramos-Horta will speak on the parallels between the Filipinos' and the Timorese's struggle for freedom and pay tribute to Ninoy's heroism and love of country.
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Jean-Louis Kayitenkore
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