USVI letters from the Youth Olympics

Over the last two weeks, eight U.S. Virgin Islands athletes were in Singapore to compete at the inaugural Youth Olympic Games, a major international sporting event that has attracted 14- to 18-year-old athletes from more than 200 countries worldwide.

The Games started Aug. 14 and the closing ceremonies were held Thursday night. USVI athletes competed in sailing, swimming, track and basketball events. As they chased gold medals and inspired Virgin Islanders along the way, USVI team members wrote about the experiences and excerpts were published in The Daily News. This is the final installment of the excerpts.



QUESTION: Not every athlete you met in Singapore spoke English. How did you bridge the communication gap and did you ever feel confused or lost while talking to other athletes?



For some athletes, I spoke to their languages, which were French, Spanish, and Portuguese. I communicated with them by motions, hand actions and I basically showed them what I was talking about and they did the same so that’s how we communicated.

— David Walter, USVI track



Sometimes trying to communicate to other athletes that didn’t speak English was hard, but we got through it using hand signals. We all were trying to do the same things so we helped each other out, even if we spoke different languages. Sometimes it got pretty confusing, but we got through it.

— Brigitte Rasmussen,
USVI swimming



QUESTION: Do you get a sense that most people knew where the U.S. Virgin Islands were located or did you have to explain it to people? How did that make you feel?



I have been wearing my Virgin Islands shirts and pants to show other people the different islands and where we come from. I gave them directions to where we live and where we come from. For many of them, they didn’t know we existed before. To show them where we we’re from was a good feeling and then they understood.

— Amadius Der-Weer,
USVI 3-on-3 basketball



Half of the athletes didn’t know where the Virgin Islands are located and to explain it made me feel like I was teaching them something. I would tell them where it’s located, and that there are three islands, St. Croix, St. Thomas, and St. John. I also would tell them about the beaches and the mountains.

— Rasheed Swanston,
USVI 3-on-3 basketball



QUESTION: Aside from competing in your respective sports, what has been your favorite thing about the YOG in Singapore and why?

My favorite part of the Youth Olympic Games was meeting new people and getting to experience a different culture for three weeks. But also getting to go to the mall and having fish eat dead skin off my feet on the last day. I was really freaked out at first but then I got used to it and thought it was really cool.

— Catherine Diaz, USVI sailing



The most memorable thing I did while I was here was going to the school and talking to the officials of the school. I learned about the schooling system here and it seemed to be similar with schools back home, just different rules and different programs. They have extracurricular activities that are done sometimes away from campus and they have a robotics class where they get to build their own robots. That was amazing.

— Kadeem Jones,
 

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