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Olympic champ turns out to be reluctant celebrity
(China Daily)
Updated: 2005-10-21 05:59
"I'm just a human being and answering all the demands of people may cost me
not only several days. If I don't have enough time for training and rest, how
could I show a good performance in the competition to reward the fans that love
me?"
Within the week that Liu was in Nanjing, he has met hundreds of requests for
signatures and photos, most of which came from relatives of Games' officials or
from people working around him.
"I have felt numb towards signing autographs and taking photos," Liu said
before his preliminaries on Wednesday. "All I have to do now is to fully
concentrate on training and competition."
But he never could escape from his adoring fans.
Since his first training in Nanjing, he has been inundated with fans taking
photos, waving his huge posters and shouting his name outside the wire meshes of
the outdoor training site.
A mere glimpse of Liu could easily satisfy his fans.
"I called his name loudly yesterday during his training, and he waved and
smiled at me, which made me feel over-excited," said Wang Zhou, a postgraduate
student from Southeast University, who missed a class to see Liu's training and
competition.
She and her roommates even spent 60 yuan to buy the 50-yuan priced tickets
from scalpers to watch Liu's preliminaries on Wednesday.
"After Liu's victory at the Athens Olympic Games, I began to pay close
attention to him, and if I have a chance, I will watch all the live broadcasting
of his competitions on TV," she said. "I think it's worthwhile to come here to
see him in person."
To avoid public attention as much as possible, Liu has to play hide-and-seek
with all his fans and media and stay at the hotel all day except for training.
But the efforts have so far been in vain.
"One morning, we made our training time earlier to avoid being disturbed by
fans, but Liu still has to face a lot of signature requests from the
volunteers," coach Sun sighed.
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