Wheels of change: Sang out to light Olympic flame

Former gymnast Sang Lan cannot twist off a bottle top without help but she has never let her physical state dictate her dreams.

Paralyzed from the chest down some nine years ago, she now hopes to follow "the Greatest," boxer Muhammad Ali, and light the Olympic flame next year.

"One of my biggest dreams is to light the 2008 Beijing Olympic flame or at least be one of the last torchbearers to pass the Olympic torch to the altar," said Sang, who drew inspiration from the three-time world heavyweight boxing champion when he lit the Olympic flame at the 1996 Atlanta Games, his hands trembling due to the onset of Parkinson's disease.

Sang, who is a wheelchair user, was one of the torchbearers when the 2004 Athens Olympic flame was handed over to Beijing.

One of China's strongest young athletes on the vault, she never doubted her ability to win an Olympic gold before tragedy struck during a practice session ahead of the 1998 Goodwill Games in New York City.

"I cannot forget the moment I woke up from the accident to find that my lower body had lost all sense of feeling," the 26-year-old told China Daily in an interview on Sunday.

"But I refused to indulge in such self-pity."

Televised images of Sang smiling immediately after her accident captured the hearts of many fans. During her ten months of rehabilitation in New York, the then 17-year-old's optimism inspired visits from former president Jimmy Carter, Superman actor Christopher Reeve, Leonardo DiCaprio and Jackie Chan. Celine Dion even showed up to sing a rendition of "My Heart Will Go On."

Sang was later chosen to join the ceremonial lowering of the ball in Times Square on New Year's Eve, 1999.

"That was one of the most memorable days of my life. I am so proud to be the first and only foreigner in the US to push that button (lowering the ball)," she said.

She also maintained a friendship with Reeve, himself paralyzed by a horsing accident, until his death in 2004.

"He's my idol and his experience inspired me. His cervical facture brought him total paralysis and he couldn't even breathe normally, but he still did a lot to raise money for the needy. I should do the same."

Reeve and his wife founded the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation, aimed at curing spinal cord injury by funding innovative research and improving the quality of life for the injured.

After her fall, Sang decided to quickly pick herself up, move on, and find a job. She graduated from Peking University this July and is capitalizing on her journalism major and athletics background.

She has been signed as a host of a talk show on sina.com, one of China's major Internet portals, and reports regularly for the official website of the Chinese Olympic Committee.

Before that, she was signed in 2004 to host a sports show named after her, "Sang Lan Olympics 2008," on Star TV, financed by Rupert Murdoch's media consortium.

"I like to be kept busy," she said.

She is vice director at the China Sports Foundation, helping China's retired athletes get a better education or medical care. She also serves as an ambassador and money-raiser for the Hong Kong University Spinal Cord Injury Fund.

In recent months she has been busy flying around China's poorest regions to promote the spread of Olympic knowledge among kids in conjunction with the Hope Project, a foundation that helps underprivileged children get an education.

"I am so shocked that many of the kids had no idea about the Olympic Games or that Beijing would be hosting them, " she said.

"I even tried to teach them some gymnastic movements with my arms," said Sang, who can still move her arms, shoulders and head.

Now she is eyeing a job as a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations.

"I want to help refugees in Africa and I want to interview the wives of presidents in different nations," she said.

Sometimes, she admits, the exposure she gets can be a little too much.

In a recent blog entry she wrote that many hurtful messages had been posted online mocking her disability.

"There was one saying that I should not 'bounce around' on public occasions if I was as seriously disabled as I claim to be.

"I laughed about the use of the word 'bounce'. At least they think I'm lively," she wrote.