English and the Olympics

I had the opportunity to watch a lot of the Winter Olympics this year. They said that this year, more countries won medals than in any other Winter Olympics. For covered events, NBC seems to try and interview the gold medalists, so we got to see a lot more athletes from different countries interviewed.

What I find embarassing as an American is that every athlete from East and West Europe that was interviewed spoke pretty decent English, and the NBC reporter could speak at normal speed. I don't know about you, but I find that absolutely amazing. I've lived in Japan for a year, and took 3 years of Japanese in college, but even still, I don't think my Japanese would be near good enough for a TV interview. How do these Europeans do it?

And as an Asian, what I find embarassing is that none of the Asian athletes that won golds were interviewed. I suspect it's because their English, well, stinks. Sometimes video bio's are done on the athletes, and the European athletes will all speak in English (granted, they have thick accents, but they are definitely understandable). The Asian athletes will always be dubbed over (at least in the Summer Games. I didn't see any Asian athlete bios this year.). Why I feel embarassed as a fellow Asian is that I know that in Asia, they've been taught English since they were in grade school. If that's the case, with so many extra years of English education, why are the Asians so bad at it, especially considering how the Europeans can probably give interviews in several different languages? It just makes me feel kind of ashamed as both an American and an Asian.

Case and point is women's figure skating. Who did they do bio's on? The Russian Slutskaya and the American Cohen are a given. They both speak English. But they didn't do one on Arakawa, the Japanese skater who was in definite gold medal contention, being only 1 point behind 1st place going into the long program. And when she eventually went on to win the gold medal in what is probably *the* cardinal event of the Winter Olympics, there was no NBC interview.

Another favorite event is short track speed skating, in which American hopes were all pinned on Apollo Anton Ohno. Instead, the South Korean Ahn Hyun-Soo beat Ohno twice, winning 2 gold medals. Who does NBC interview? Of course, Ohno. Not a single interview with the Turino 2-time gold medalist.

Now don't get me wrong. I actually consider the English-impaired Asians the normal people. Learning a new language is hard. Instead, my question is how is it that the Europeans not only are so much better, but make it look so easy? I thought Asians were supposed to be the smart ones.