Saturday, August 23, 2008

Table Manner

With all due respect to the world class table tennis player Wang Nan, she had wonderful performance in women's singles table tennis Olympic game last night.

Did you say she lost her Olympic gold medal? Did she?

If you ask me, I would rather say Wang did well to win a silver. Yes, she won the silver medal with her signature smiles. She cracked a big smile, occasionally sticking out her tongue, even after losing points. The point is not that she wins or loses; her humorous ability to experience moments of pleasure - even in the face of Olympic final - is at the heart of every one of us who watched the game.

As a Tibetan saying goes, "When you smile at life, half the smile is for your face, the other half for somebody else’s." Indeed, her smile radiates throughout the packed Peking University Gymnasium, all the way across the globe via television broadcast.

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