Dear Gossips,
We are in Whistler with our families and many of our friends. It’s Day 99 of the 2010 Torch Relay and I will be running the Olympic Torch tonight at 6:40pm in Whistler Village, the Host Mountain Resort of the 2010 Winter Olympics. Someone said to me the other day – there’s only ONE flame. I will be carrying That Flame. And it’s the flame that will eventually light the Olympic Cauldron in one week, February 12th, to commemorate the beginning of the Games. Canada’s Games.
Still don’t really believe it. They told me last Fall and I haven’t wanted to share it because I’m so superstitious, I thought I might jinx it. Then the package arrived from Coca-Cola in December with the Torch Relay uniform – pants and jacket and toque and the red mittens – and a comprehensive guide and little flags for my cheering section, a plastic sign for them to hold up, a night light in the shape of a Coke bottle, a marker, and a confirmation letter about my location... this is when it became real. As for the torch, it isn’t presented to you until just before you run. Afterward you can take it home.
Today I’ll be meeting with other runners, we’ll attend a briefing, then we’ll climb onto a bus, and rally each other as we get dropped off one by one at our stop points. The torch route is marked according to each runner’s segment. Every runner is assigned a number. So our loved ones will look for those numbers and wait for us to pass by.
My father will be waiting for me at the start point. He moved here from Hong Kong, the 6th of 10 children from meagre beginnings, raised on a farm even though they were not a farming family, so poor they had to share turnips for dinner some nights with no light. Dad is a quiet, introverted person. He doesn’t say much. He wasn’t much when he arrived here: barely educated, no money, and not much motivation for more until I came along, at which point he worked 2 jobs, put himself through night school, and somehow finished high school equivalency before continuing on and completing an accounting degree.
My mother will be waiting for me at the end point. She recently learned how to use her camera by nagging a service person at an electronics store for 2 hours. She’ll be asking everyone around her to take pictures of her. Because this is her moment. Mother has been broken by betrayal, a bad kidney, saved by a transplant, and is currently battling some kind of thyroid issue. I try not to worry. Because Mother is the Chinese Squawking Chicken. She will smack a bitch before the bitch even knows. But she became that by circumstance and she fought hard for 30 years to make sure that circumstance never defined me.
Their story is no more, no less than most Canadian immigrant stories. And those stories are no more and no less than the ones belonging to the 12,000 other torchbearers on the relay. We’re all doing it for more than just ourselves. I’m doing it for two people who had nothing, who busted their asses to make sure that I did not end up with nothing, who will watch me running with the torch tonight and proudly declare, as they have declared every day of my life, that I am the best thing they ever did.
And they did it here, in CANADA.
Please forgive my corny. It’s been an emotional few days. My mother hasn’t yelled at me once, and she keeps giving out hugs. She has us a little freaked out. I feel very sorry for the innocent bystanders who have to be near her later tonight.
As you imagine, it’s an extraordinary day for our family. So I will not be blogging after Tingles. A thousand apologies for the inconvenience and so much appreciation for your understanding. Will be back strong and smutty on Monday...
Yours in gossip and in Olympic spirit,
Lainey
~ Elaine Lui, celebrity blogger
