Congratulations to China's Eileen Gu.
The young woman was born and raised in California, learned to ski at Lake Tahoe and trained in America. When the time came to compete, she and her mother chose the mother's native China for her citizenship status, and look at her now!
Competing for the home team, she has won multiple medals, including gold, in her skiing events, and is loved by China.
An adult now, it surely must have been a difficult choice for the young woman, who with her mother's guidance, chose her family ties over her newfound country. In the long run, it might have been a wise choice although she likely will now be expected to stay and settle in China, marry an ethnic Chines even if American educated, and make her home nation proud -- like a 21st century reclaimed Elian Gonzalez.
It would not have been my choice -- at every step along the way I am so glad my father came here and I was born American. I'd never swap that out for fame or riches, but I can see the incentive...
Like in womens' basketball, the overseas market for female athletes pays millions more to compete abroad in China, Russia, Europe. The tens of thousands they earned playing at home here was not much compared to the global market, and the union=salary cap for the star athletes was only lifted in recent WNBA contract negotiations.
The women athletes with finite careers, and bodies that tend to enlarge and slow with age, were losing money playing only in America when the real cash advantage was playing for foreign fans. One year, earlier in the century, Diana Taurasi was paid by a Russian team to sit out her American WNBA season to get healthy enough to compete overseas. WNBA fans did not like it, but the woman has rightly kept her body healthy to play, built the stereotypical two-child family with her wife, hopefully invested well, and will no doubt have a career in the industry when her active playing days end, devotedly building the league...
Taurasi did not surrender her citizenship though. She was paid to play in other countries, not under their flag. None of America's WNBA athletes competing abroad were amateurs though; the chosen ones with superior playing skills all suited up for Team America when the USA competed as a nation, in the Summer Olympics back in the days when superior American resources helped our athletes dominate the Games...
We haven't heard -- maybe no reporter has asked? -- where Eileen Gu plans to live post Olympics, and whether China will accept or permit her to keep dual citizenship in the United States. My guess is no. The money for her modeling work will lead to a luxurious life, in China, and fans will flock to see her, in China. It won't look good if she tries to "switch back" in four years, and ski with the American team.
Gu must have good memories of California, and the time she spent here with us, but in choosing to return "home" to compete, she left a lot of non-athletic benefits on the table...
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ADDED: I wonder what types of vaccinations Eileen Gu and the Chinese Olympics teams have, MRNA or otherwise.
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