Yuna Kim

I love that someone young was asked to address this international gathering. Most of the people in the room spend a lot of their times in rooms like this and in offices. They need a reminder of the people whose world they're trying to improve. On the other hand, a lot of kids don't spend any time thinking about what it might take to make a difference in the world, and many youngsters just assume they have no power to make that difference. So a speech like this brings together two groups who ought to be speaking to one another on a regular basis. Good move! And YuNa did a splendid job.

I love the idea of "where there's peace, there's culture, and where there's culture, there's peace"--and YuNa's addition of sport to the mix. As she said in the public service announcement, kids should get to do more than just survive. Franklin Roosevelt once outlined what he called the Four Freedoms: freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom from want, and freedom from fear. The last two always strike me as especially meaningful, and they mean even more nowadays.

Two LA based American male coaches are currently the candidates for Yuna Kim’s new coach. If Yuna Kim’s new coach is decided, she plans to announce her new coach soon after the start of the 2010 All That Skate LA.

Olympia said:

I love that someone young was asked to address this international gathering. Most of the people in the room spend a lot of their times in rooms like this and in offices. They need a reminder of the people whose world they're trying to improve. On the other hand, a lot of kids don't spend any time thinking about what it might take to make a difference in the world, and many youngsters just assume they have no power to make that difference. So a speech like this brings together two groups who ought to be speaking to one another on a regular basis. Good move! And YuNa did a splendid job.

I love the idea of "where there's peace, there's culture, and where there's culture, there's peace"--and YuNa's addition of sport to the mix. As she said in the public service announcement, kids should get to do more than just survive. Franklin Roosevelt once outlined what he called the Four Freedoms: freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom from want, and freedom from fear. The last two always strike me as especially meaningful, and they mean even more nowadays.

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Olympia, your eloquence always amazes me; are you in a history-related profession? Because I just memorized Roosevelt's 4 Freedom's speech last year for my AP US History class and I've already forgotten the freedoms he listed

This is kind of random, but I really hope that Yu-na skates to new age music one day; maybe Enya or Kitaro: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ulc51ZOGQk or this lovely masterpiece (it's in Chinese btw): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYE5Hfd7fA4&feature=related, this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzi7zl4670Y

Thanks for the compliment, Lilith, and for the wonderful links. Kitaro is a great idea for skating music. I also love Enya, and she's full of possibilities. I also recently found part of the soundtrack (by the great Ennio Morricone) for an old Italian-American TV miniseries, Marco Polo. Here's one selection that I found on YouTube. I especially like the section from the beginning up through about 3:60. There's plenty in the remainder to flesh out the needed time for a long program.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkjiOUocLFg

Olympia said:

Thanks for the compliment, Lilith, and for the wonderful links. Kitaro is a great idea for skating music. I also love Enya, and she's full of possibilities. I also recently found part of the soundtrack (by the great Ennio Morricone) for an old Italian-American TV miniseries, Marco Polo. Here's one selection that I found on YouTube. I especially like the section from the beginning up through about 3:60. There's plenty in the remainder to flesh out the needed time for a long program.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkjiOUocLFg

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I really don't understand why we don't hear more New Age music used by skaters; there's something so uplifting and spiritual about that genre of music. And there are so many severely unknown Japanese composes like Kitaro, Joe Hiyashi, Yuki Kaijura, etc. And the piece of music you posted is gorgeous Olympia! The beginning is so soft and yet tense with a sort of impending doom and mournful sadness laced in it and then it suddenly builds into this soaring piece at about the 1:20 mark and then it calms down a bit. I especially love the sound of the strings (is it?) or flutes that stand out from the orchestra. :3

Yuki Kaijura: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVZJODGyYMw - I think Yu-na can do justice to the fast pace of this song with her style of skating
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGBGEcJDGV8

A large number of posts was deleted from this thread due to several posters insulting each other. This is against the guidelines. It is possible for posters to agree and disagree with tact. Further insults and jibes will result in banning.

For those who do not recognize what an insult is, the following items are insults:
Accusations that someone is a 'bot' of someone.
Accusations that someone is stupid or senile.
Accusations that someone is lying.
Accusations that someone is a drunk or a narcotics user.

And if you think you might be going over the line, you probably are.

Yuna's spotted in NY time square. According to the poster, the photo was taken by this picture is a Korean American passing by.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4105/5003780155_6e93bfe08a_b.jpg

Yuna and UN's Secretary General and his wife: http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/bba6364cb0d662887bf2416a15c5f6236g.jpg



UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Kim Yu-na Visits United Nations

http://english.chosun.com/site/data...mz+demilitarized+zone+jsa+joint+security+area

Olympia said:

I love that someone young was asked to address this international gathering. Most of the people in the room spend a lot of their times in rooms like this and in offices. They need a reminder of the people whose world they're trying to improve. On the other hand, a lot of kids don't spend any time thinking about what it might take to make a difference in the world, and many youngsters just assume they have no power to make that difference. So a speech like this brings together two groups who ought to be speaking to one another on a regular basis. Good move! And YuNa did a splendid job.

I love the idea of "where there's peace, there's culture, and where there's culture, there's peace"--and YuNa's addition of sport to the mix. As she said in the public service announcement, kids should get to do more than just survive. Franklin Roosevelt once outlined what he called the Four Freedoms: freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom from want, and freedom from fear. The last two always strike me as especially meaningful, and they mean even more nowadays.

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Hi Olympia, I just want to say I love your post here and inspire me to delurk for the moment I just want to add I think Yuna makes an interesting choice for UNICEF for the very points you mentioned but also because of her background profile.

It is often very easy to feel misaligned as part of the Global society if you are a minority because of your race, age, gender, nationality, social status and particularly youth who simply doesn't have enough credibility to voice opinions with any effect and that make them entirely vulnerable. Yuna's own profile and accomplishments somehow broke through these moulds and that makes her an great choice for the United Nations particularly to countries which are not part of the G8.

Unlike most famous youth today (hard to name even 5 who are not of the Hollywood, MTV, Disney related) Her accomplishments are well earned rather than given or manufactured by big corporations. She is a leader of her sport. Her story well documented in this youtube age (pimples, bad hair days, injuries and all) because she is not strict with her image rights, and her fans were unbashful celebrate her success this makes her ability to penetrate the free press/media easily especially amongst the media savvy youth and admirers outside the figure skating community covering wide demographic base. It also helps when what she does on ice, you don't really need the English language to understand and appreciate.

Although she is a super star in her own country, privately she doesn't dress up or appear behave like one. Although she's an athlete, she's not typical of what an athlete look like or even behave. Her years of charitable work starting from home also gives her credibility to the cause she tries to promote on UNICEF's behalf. Infact her very ordinariness and hardwork ethics makes her a relateable teenager, the very ones UN desires to reach out to; the ones who want/dare to dream big, and unafraid to work really hard towards it and over come any economic disadvantages, be it to study their way out of disadvantaged situations to improve own and countrymen's lives and put their country back together.

Amongst the most politically free nations in the world, we don't have a youth culture that celebrate youth in a positive way without the negative connotation. I'd even goes far as to say in the west, the biggest deterrents to success are fears of ridicule from peers rather than any economic conditions related. And even when the media tries to make it work, youth rarely buys into it. Weirdly, most of these negative connotations are to do with Academics but not Sports. Therefore to have an Athlete bridging the gap makes her an excellent choice.

Personally I think (hoping) with all these new added social responsibilities and 'happenings' may inspire her to stay at least 1 more season, we will see.

os168 said:

Unlike most famous youth today (hard to name even 5 who are not of the Hollywood, MTV, Disney related) Her accomplishments are well earned rather than given or manufactured by big corporations. She is a leader of her sport. Her story well documented in this youtube age (pimples, bad hair days, injuries and all) because she is not strict with her image rights, and her fans were unbashful celebrate her success this makes her ability to penetrate the free press/media easily especially amongst the media savvy youth and admirers outside the figure skating community covering wide demographic base. It also helps when what she does on ice, you don't really need the English language to understand and appreciate.

Amongst the most politically free nations in the world, we don't have a youth culture that celebrate youth in a positive way without the negative connotation. I'd even goes far as to say in the west, the biggest deterrents to success are fears of ridicule from peers rather than any economic conditions related. And even when the media tries to make it work, youth rarely buys into it. Weirdly, most of these negative connotations are to do with Academics but not Sports. Therefore to have an Athlete bridging the gap makes her an excellent choice.

Personally I think (hoping) with all these new added social responsibilities and 'happenings' may inspire her to stay at least 1 more season, we will see.

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I've extracted a few paragrphs from your quote that get at something very profound. What you said about having a youth culture that doesn't celebrate youth in a positive way is so true. I mean, Lindsay Lohan on the cover of every magazine? Not that all kids are like Lindsay Lohan by a long shot, but why is that the behavior we are glorifying? There are scads of kids doing good, positive things, including studying hard to prepare themselves for the future, and they're considered the uncool geeks--why is that? On the other side of the scale, scads of kids (and not just kids!) feel that they have absolutely no voice in the important forums of the world. They feel overwhelmed by the scale and scope of the world's problems. Why bother to get engaged with anything, with so much going wrong? And yet here's YuNa, taking a stand against problems. Whatever motivates her--compassion, a sense of duty, respectful obedience to some much-admired adult in her life--she's putting in a mature effort that does justice to her generation.

Interesting point that you end with, os168, that you hope that her social responsibilities might motivate her to stay in competitive skating so as to have the largest forum possible. That's a nice thought.

De-lurk more often!

os168

I think there is a tension among the ideal of youth: You want to do well and mean well, but in a way that affirms your individuality and sense of forging a new, different, improved path from what typical adults want or advise you to do. It is extremely rare to pull off this balancing act.

You can be an amazing student, get top grades, have a lot of extracurriculars and community involvement, and those are things that many students want to do themselves, but it is "uncool" because it can be so easily celebrated by parents and teachers, too. It's not that their praise isn't to be desired, but it takes away from a sense of taking your own direction, of pushing your own envelopes. Youth sometimes want to feel empowered by chucking "rules" out the window - but often, as Olympia's Lindsay Lohan example shows, it means doing it in a destructive way that gives almost no value back to friends/family/society. Justin Bieber is another polarizing teen figure: there are scores of girls who seem to like him, but scores of girls and boys who hate him. He seems like a nice kid, but he represents something too generic, manufactured/commercial.

Well, YuNa managed to find success in something that is very much off the beaten path in Korea. She had her cute/slightly awkward early teen years, and she grew up gracefully. She is a devoted daughter but she also has her own preferences and feels free to express both her likes and dislikes. She is confident in herself, but has an idol she openly admires and looks up to. She is a good, hardworking student (haters can point out that she failed a university course in her Olympic year, but most skaters at her level aren't enrolled in university, let alone taking classes where students have to do more than just engage in their respective sporting activities) although her skating was/is a priority. So, she is a good mix of loyalty to standard parental wishes and ordinary expectations of a "good kid"...together with a unique character and extraordinary talents/guts. These are all things that made me a fan of hers.

One might say that her mother pushed her in skating so she was actually doing her "good daughter" thing, but I don't believe it was her mother who caused her to be so entranced by another skater's Olympic skate that she memorized each move. The motivation and desire was in her. At least, that's the way I see it.

brownfox said:

Yuna's spotted in NY time square. According to the poster, the photo was taken by this picture is a Korean American passing by.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4105/5003780155_6e93bfe08a_b.jpg

Yuna and UN's Secretary General and his wife: http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/bba6364cb0d662887bf2416a15c5f6236g.jpg



UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Kim Yu-na Visits United Nations

http://english.chosun.com/site/data...mz+demilitarized+zone+jsa+joint+security+area

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Wow great picture in Times Square! She looks very happy. But why did she wear a grandmother dress to the United Nations? Please, she has a good body. I know this is conservative event, but that dress?

Tinymavy15 said:

Wow great picture in Times Square! She looks very happy. But why did she wear a grandmother dress to the United Nations? Please, she has a good body. I know this is conservative event, but that dress?

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I don't see anything wrong with it...I think it's alright.

Kim Yu-na to Name New Coach Soon

“I have two candidates in mind and both of them are from Los Angeles. I will soon name my new coach,” she said.

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http://english.donga.com/srv/service.php3?bicode=070000&biid=2010092095188

Tinymavy15 said:

Wow great picture in Times Square! She looks very happy. But why did she wear a grandmother dress to the United Nations? Please, she has a good body. I know this is conservative event, but that dress?

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I think she looks great! If anything, I think her hair could have been pulled out of her face, but that's not a criticism--just my personal preference. Yuna looks good in anything she wears!

brownfox said:

Kim Yu-na to Name New Coach Soon



http://english.donga.com/srv/service.php3?bicode=070000&biid=2010092095188

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Here is another article on the same subject with more quotes from Yu-na:

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/sports/2010/09/136_73293.html

UNICEF’s new Goodwill Ambassador Yuna Kim, in an interview with UNifeed, talked about her new role, and her fans had recently donated money to UNICEF to help children affected by the floods in Pakistan.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPcI9SKKKrU

Tinymavy15 said:

Wow great picture in Times Square! She looks very happy. But why did she wear a grandmother dress to the United Nations? Please, she has a good body. I know this is conservative event, but that dress?

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If it ended right above the knee and she paired it with leggings / dark pantyhose, I'd actually say it's the perfect combination of style and UN-appropriateness.

South Korea's Kim Yuna finds some breathing room in Los Angeles

By Helene Elliott

September 21, 2010|6:34 p.m.

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-elliott-kim-yuna-20100922,0,4389763.column

Good article by Helen Elliot.

The following is a translation of a Chinese blog post (23.3.2010) about Yuna and Mao during the Olympics.

The original text can be found here: http://liarliar.blogbus.com/logs/61003281.html

The blogger is a casual viewer, and not even a fan of the sport but felt enchanted enough to write up the following blog entry. Some of the feelings might have been shared by the forum, and others might clearly disagree with it, but I thought it is a refreshing philosophical view to analyse the event, the performance, the sport and the competitors from an impartial casual viewer from China who knows nothing about skating.

This is the very same type of new fans who became attracted to the sports because of a single performance, and can make this sport something else beyond.

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Today I want to describe everything. It started since the Winter Olympics.

Before the Olympics began, there were a documentary on the Chinese network television to review past Olympics, and outline potential highlights for the upcoming Olympics 2010. I am someone who doesn't do sport and naturally have no interest in sports, but since that that documentary that highlighted the Ladies Figure Skating, there was a competitor that caught my attention, that left me stunned and breathless. Her name is Kim Yuna, Korean, 19 years old. From my observation from past great ladies skaters, I have not see such an graceful, natural, expressive skater. From the moment she spun in the air to the moment she land... woww.. how should one even begin to describe? The word 'faultless' is not enough, as it implies using techniques expertly to skate, but she's beyond that. In enduring the long and hard working training, she seems to have surpassed everything and reached the heights where she forget herself. The ice has became a stage, she forgot her nationality or that she is participating in a event that doesn't allow mistakes. She remind me of the raw moments when you first became acquainted with certain classical master pieces for the very first time, where logic can not be used to describe your impressions and complex feelings. It opened my eyes, at those moment it surpasses from merely 'a sport' or the 'nature of competitive' sport, but the 'essence' of the sport.

During the actual Olympics, my wife and I observed her rivalry with the Japanese Mao Asada with interest, having read about their rivalry since age 16, being the same age, they were frequently exchanging worlds top 1 and 2. Compare to Yuna's ideal athletic figure proportions, open expressions and and confident demeanour; Maos's appearance is more delicate in comparison and her figure is more petite and fragile.

Her program was suppose to be the more technically difficult, and although I do not understand these technical terms, it was the impressions I gained from the broadcast. What make it it even more interesting is Yuna's coach is from Canada, while Mao's coach was from Moscow. Yuna's program is Gershwin's Concerto in F, while Asada's is Grandbell of Moscow.

Yuna's performance does not need further explanation, flawless, succinct, direct and simply delightful. When I heard Mao was to perform Moscow's grand bell, I became anxious for her, not only did she picked the most difficult elements, she decide to join it with such a profound tragic Russian type sorrowful music. What will happen? Unsurprisingly, I saw Mao Asada's petite stature seems crushed with the huge burden of the piece and her nerves were not able to withstand even though they gained valuable points. Behind her bravery, the majestic and powerful Moscow's Grand Bell rang the the most painful shattering heart in this competitive sport, and Mao Asada displays the type of despair that makes one trembles with hopelessness, the type of despair compels from the determined pursuit to exceed one's limitations, and she were not able to fully exhibit the artistic expressions needed with this Russian high art piece.

All this is too interesting. They work equally hard, similarly gifted, but Yuna's performance brought us the delight from competitive sport. Her smile and tears are simple and clear; Mao's performance brought us the nervous tensions and expectations to surpassing her limits. The type of 'No mistakes, I must win' attitude. Here are 2 types of methods, 2 types of attitudes, 2 types of cultures? What I saw was Mao upon completing the most complex element, she smiled are like sighs of relief, like a heavy burden has been lifted. Her talent deserves acclaim and was very moving. It made us to think 'This is too hard' with sympathy. With Yuna, she made us think 'This is too beautiful'.

Looking at these 2 competitor's performance, I had been trying to describe Yuna in the most simple accurate way from the far distance of a casual observer. How to describe what impression left us most satisfied; power, speed, beauty?

They seems at odds with each other, and the three seems have no correlations. While one can try to remain neutral but when it is trying to describe the extraordinary talent of a gifted sport artist then it became somewhat a hopeless cause. Perhaps the following 3 groups of words are more more apt, it is something we grew up with (Translator's note: this is a Chinese philosophy and principle to approach life)

Truth, Goodness, Beauty
(真、善、美, http://baike.baidu.com/view/93855.htm)

So you ask why the final word is still Beauty and not something else? The whole point was to have separation of the group of words “Power, Speed, Beauty” and “ Truth, Goodness, Beauty” to provide a deeper understanding and realisation, so why is “Beauty” is still featured last?

What is Truth?
In my opinion, it incorporate everything within your real situation, including your birth, your talent, your environment, the time periods you experienced, basically everything nature provide you.

What is Goodness?
My long personal contemplation on this meaning has changed throughout a life time. When we were young, adult tell us, Goodness is being kind, you must have good conscious, good principles and intentions, have kind heart, be a good person. On its opposite is the extreme scary word: Evil/Badness. However now my view which had been drawn out over time, it is more to do with 'Goodness with', in other words, goodness is a type of method, the type that originate from the 'truth' which you understood best to face the world. It is a type of progress, a journey, that took sensibility, thoughts, and actions to find your own path. The path is yours to follow only, and nothing to do with anyone else. This pursuit is full of loneliness, pain, hurt, brilliance, colour, lightness, darkness, despair and nobility all counted towards the prospect of gaining goodness. So where does that take us?

Beauty. Here, beauty is what we ultimately wish to strive for whether it is the lightest or the darkest path we follow. It is not easily achieved. To attain beauty or a state of grace, it doesn't matter if you are right or wrong, win or loose, it is an independent sparkling spatial existence. It is the very ending as well as the very beginning, it exist as a type of euphoria, or a peace of mind that one attain happiness, comfort, joy. In this sport, it is solving the mysterious algorithm of 'strength/power' and 'speed' in total sum, calculated to the highest heavens that elevate one's life existence and pushes to edges of unbounded potentials. One realise the 'boundary' of limitations has no meaning, but its significance is something we are unable to restrain from asking. Frankly, when we discuss about 'beauty', one is unwilling to investigate it, it is something not easily touched, discussed, and sometimes it appears accidentally or purely by chance. It flows in our consciousness, the moment it happens, it dies and is unable to be captured again.

Is it eternal? Can Kim Yuna's state of beauty last in the sport? Can her youthful face be forever still? If her form is being sculpted, painted, made into movies, does that count as eternal? That is why it make us heart stricken when we realise these moments of attaining beauty, we find ourselves unknowingly tearing up asking ourself “Oh my oh my .. what is wrong with me?”

(...The author concludes at this point that he have lost his objectivity by this paragraph and he does't feel he can continue and bid his readers farewell.)

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Comments left on his blog

When you look at Kim Yuna carefree forget herself performances, it is like watching she's loved by God.
Watching Mao is like watching a dignified tragedy. Solemn and respectful that makes it hard to breathe.

Although both of their performances and expressions are very interesting. Yuna was so relaxed she looks like she is playing with toy, while Mao is completing a type of serious ceremony.

Beauty does bring us sadness. Why forever? It is only momentary.

Thanks so much for posting that. As you say, one could disagree with the particulars, but that's irrelevant. The point of this blog is that someone has been thunderstruck by skating, which is pretty much the same feeling I had when I first encountered skating in the person of John Curry. This blogger was lucky enough to find skating at a moment of unparalleled excellence, so that the first thing he saw was its profound possibilities to evoke beauty and express something wordless from the center of the soul.

As impressed as I am with the blog, I think I like those three comments at the end even more. The first comment's characterization of Yuna's skating that night as making her seem "loved by God" reminds me of what Boitano said about skating his 1988 long program at Calgary: he felt as though angels were lifting him for each jump. The characterizing of Mao's effort as "solemn and respectful that makes it hard to [breathe]" is equally gorgeous. Then the second comment about Yuna seeming to be "playing with toy" and Mao appearing to be "completing a type of serious ceremony" is also a splendid contrast. Both of these comments bring YuNa and Mao into sharp focus for me and underline the monumental effect on me (and obviously others) of that wonderful night of skating.

The last comment about the ephemeral nature of beauty--pure poetry.