PyeongChang 2018 - Day -9 (January 31st)

Welcome to our 13th Olympic adventure! It is amazing to me that I've been doing this for nearly 40 years. New readers to this blog are probably wondering why the heck anyone would want to go to that many Olympics. Well, there are several answers to this question. The simplest is that Beth and I love both travel and sports so this is a great way to do both. We figure that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is just helping us decide where to go and what to see.  There is also a deeper reason, at least for me. You see, I was bullied as a teenager. One of the positive developments of that awful experience was that I developed a strong internal drive to become the best that I could be at anything I do, be it classes, athletics or online video games. I simply did not want to give anyone a reason to criticize my performance. So what has this got to do with the Olympics? It took me a long time to figure out that out. I finally realized that every Olympic athlete works exactly the same way. Continuous improvement is their way of life. So nothing gives me a bigger thrill than to see an athlete produce a performance that they themselves did not believe that they were capable of - and that can happen to any Olympic athlete, not just to the medal favorites.

Given the recent North Korean missile tests and the leaders of North Korea and the United States arguing about who has the largest nuclear button, many people thought that we were crazy to go to PyeongChang for the Olympics. My initial reaction was that people, at least in the US, have become a little too risk intolerant. Where are the people who moved to distant lands when many still believed that you could fall off the edge of the world or be eaten by sea monsters? Where are the people who gladly traveled to the moon even though they knew that there was a significant risk of death in the process? I can certainly understand that most people perceive the world as a more dangerous place than it has ever been. This perception is clearly aided by the cell phone sitting in your pocket that delivers news of every terrorist attack or other atrocity that happens anywhere in the world within a few moments. But people who keep track of this stuff for a living indicate that now is actually one of the safer periods in human history - homicides are down worldwide, violence against both women and children is down worldwide, the number of wars and the size of the wars are both down. Don't believe me? Please check out Steven Picker's book The Better Angels of Our Nature.

But again, there was a deeper reason for taking a small risk to go to these Olympics. In fact, it is one of the main reasons that the Olympics were recreated in the late 19th century. Pierre de Coubertin was an French aristocrat who took an interest in education, and in particular, physical education. He eventually became one of the leading advocates for reestablishment of the Olympic Games. There were three ideals that he viewed as most important:

1. The belief that the ancient Olympics encouraged competition among amateurs instead of professionals. (So much for this one!)
2. The belief that the struggle to overcome one's opponent was more important than a victory.
3. The belief that the Olympics could lead to lasting peace through the Olympic Truce and the tendency of athletic competitions to promote cross-cultural understanding.

So, one of the purposes of the Olympics is to try to make the world a more peaceful place. If I am fortunate enough to meet one of the small handful of North Korean athletes, I will do my best to show that not all Americans are like that guy in the White House. And if someone really is crazy enough to push their button during the Olympics, then there is nowhere that I would rather be when the end comes.

Stay tuned for our next update,  which will come from Seoul and will update everyone on our itinerary for what should be a great Olympic Games.