This year at the Olympic Games in Rio, you might stumble across a pretty interesting sight outside the various stadiums holding competitions around the city, and meet Chen Guanming, a 60-year-old Chinese farmer who pedaled his rickshaw (人力车) all the way from China to Rio.
He calls himself “Olympic madman” and surely he deserves it: this is the third Olympic Games he rode to. Brazilians welcomed him with the best friendship and a splendid show after he arrived in Rio a week earlier.
Seventeen years ago, he embarked on the crazy adventure as an Olympics chaser: he toured around China before attending the Beijing Olympics in 2008, then made it to London in 2012, and now he’s in Rio. He plans to finish his global journey in Tokyo for the 2020 Olympics.
He doesn’t really have money, but strangers he met on the road have been pouring support to him: a heartfelt encouragement, a warm meal, or a lift up a hill — the rickshaw, his good buddy, carries all his luggage and weighs as heavy as 400 pounds.
Zsofia Korodi, a Hungarian living in London, set up a Facebook fan page after “inspired by his actions”, so that supporters could keep track of him. That way his journeys were pieced together, and people called out the next town to look out for and take care of him. When there’s water to cross, people he met flew him over, and he would patiently wait for the rickshaw to arrive by ship.
Chen spent two years traveling almost 40,000 miles to get to the London Olympics. For Rio, he hopped a plane to Canada and then made his way from Canada through the US, South America to Rio. Chen said he did it all to promote the Olympic spirit. “My biggest hope is to encourage the vulnerable, the weak, and those who are afraid of challenges.”
In Rio, he’s apparently becoming an Olympic celebrity — a sportsman that competes out of the fields, with himself and gets stopped wherever he goes to take pictures. Even though he couldn’t watch the games at the scene, he’s completely happy by helping to pick up trash and clean the surrounding areas of the stadiums. That’s what the Olympics are about, in his own words, “to challenge the boundaries, compete in a friendly manner, and win the honor of the higher calling.”
【小题1】Mr. Chen calls himself “Olympic madman” because ________.| A．he has a bad temper whenever Olympic Games come |
| B．he rides to Olympic Games as a crazy Olympics chaser |
| C．he becomes super busy with his business in the the Olympic season |
| D．he gets splendid results every time he competes in Olympic Games |
| A．Beijing. | B．Rio. |
| C．London. | D．Tokyo. |
| A．He wanted to win the honor of Olympics at the scene. |
| B．He planned to challenge and compete in a friendly manner. |
| C．He hoped to promote the Olympic spirit and encourage others. |
| D．He intended to pick up trash and clean the surrounding areas of the stadiums. |
