FLAG BEARER LOMONG LIVING AMERICAN, OLYMPIC DREAMS
By David Monti
(c) 2008 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved. Used with permission.

BEIJING (08-Aug) -- For the USA flag bearer for tonight's Olympic Games Opening Ceremony, Lopez Lomong, his journey from war-torn Sudan to the National Stadium here is one of the great miracles of these Games.  He is truly the embodiment of both the American and Olympic Dreams.

The 23 year-old 1500m runner, who is competing in his first Olympics, told his story of escape, survival and ultimately athletic fulfillment to a room of hundreds of reporters at the Main Press Center here.  Wide-eyed and deliberate, he explained how he escaped from the clutches of the Janjaweed militia with three friends he called his "Angels," making it to the Kenyan border after three days on the run.

"'At midnight we're going to go home,'" Lomong recalls his Angels telling him.  He was only six years-old at the time.  "We escaped through a crack in the door.  We started crawling.  That's where my race started."

And what a race it has been.  After evading capture in the Sudan, the foursome was intercepted by the Kenyan border patrol and placed in a refuge camp.  That's where Lomong would live for the next ten years, and where his Olympic dream would be born.  With just five Kenyan shillings in his pocket, he walked five miles with several friends from the camp to a house where there was a black and white television set tuned to the 1996 Olympic Games.  He had to hand over the five shillings --all the money he had-- to get in the house to see the broadcast.

"I didn't even know what Olympics is," Lomong remembered thinking.

On that little screen, Lomong watched American superstar Michael Johnson performing in Atlanta.  He couldn't believe that people would fill a stadium to watch people running.  In his life, running was mostly for transportation, or escape.

"I tell you, he was fast," said Lomong of Johnson.  "I want to run as fast as that guy and I want to run for that country."

Lomong got his break when an announcement was circulated in the camp in 2001 that the United States was willing to accept 500 of these refuges, the so-called Lost Boys of Sudan, through an application process.  Lomong decided to apply (he would have to tell his life story on paper), but he only spoke his native Sudanese tongue and the Swahili he had learned in the camp.

"I went out to my tent to think about it," he said.  "I didn't have any words in English."

Three weeks later he was invited in for an interview, and was informed he was selected for repatriation to the United States.  At age 16 he flew to America into the care of Barbara and Robert Rogers of Tully, N.Y.  They picked up Lomong at the airport and on the way home stopped at a McDonald's for a meal.  Lomong recalls getting a chicken sandwich, and before he finished it he felt satisfied.  His adoptive parents told him it was OK to throw the rest of the sandwich away because they had more food at home, but for a boy who usually only ate once a day that was impossible, especially chicken.

"In the camp we had chicken twice a year, on Christmas and Easter," Lomong said.  "One chicken shared by ten kids.  We cut the little pieces of chicken, we put a big load of water, and we boiled it, and put a lot of salt.  And we just shared the soup of the water.  If you get a little piece of chicken, Merry Christmas to you."

Lomong had to learn everything about Western life from the Rogers and his teachers at school.  He had to be told how to mix hot and cold water in order to take a shower, and he had to learn English.  But he did not have to be taught how to run.  As a senior in 2003, he finished sixth at the Foot Locker Northeast Regional cross country championships, and the following year was second at the Nike Indoor High School Championships in the mile.  That launched him to a collegiate career at Northern Arizona University, capped by NCAA titles at 3000m indoors and 1500m outdoors in 2007.  On July 6, 2007, he became an American citizen and exactly one year later, an Olympian, finishing third at the U.S. Trials in Eugene last month.

"They say dreams make history," said Lomong who clearly felt honored to have been elected by his Olympic Team peers to be the flag bearer.  "I don't even have a word for it.  I'm so happy."



Photo by JANE MONTI