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Volume 13, Issue #1. Published on November 3, 2004
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Year of the Yao
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Harim Martinez
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‘Ming’, means ‘light.’ Two Chinese characters are used to write it; the first one means ‘the sun’ and the second ‘the moon.’ Brought together they mean ‘light day and night, at all times,’ appropriate for a man trying to live in two different cultural worlds.
Basketball player Yao Ming has recently added the title of author to his accomplishments with his autobiographical book A Life In Two Worlds.
Invited onto the talk show circuit, Yao said, "My name is Yao Ming. That’s what everybody calls me, but in America the right way would be to say Ming Yao, because Yao is my family name."
At 24 years old, and towering at 7' 6," Yao is one of the most respected and popular players in the NBA. The Houston Rockets’ center is native to China and is the first number one draft pick in professional basketball history to be foreign-born.
Until now, not much was known about the personal life of this towering giant, but in his memoirs he details the winding journey he underwent to get to the NBA. Yao is strongly opinionated about his self-identity, he has bridged between two different cultures while achieving to live the American dream.
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Photo courtesy of NBA
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Basketball player contemplates is rise to fame in a new book.
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Revered in his homeland, Yao takes his celebrity status with a pinch of salt. Yao said, “I’m not a hero. I don’t think what I’m doing makes me a big hero. I'm just doing my job.”
“Maybe that’s what this book is all about. There are many reasons. One is that I am a private person; that is my personality. Another is that I’ve always thought only heroes write books or have books written about them.
“It’s important to understand the difference between heroes in the U.S. and in China. In the U.S., the heroes in movies and books almost always live. They face danger and they have the chance to die, but they don’t. In China, the biggest heroes are those who have died for their country - not always (the first Chinese astronaut will be a hero no matter what happens), but usually.”
What finally pushed Yao to tell his personal story was reading one of the numerous biographies being printed about him. “It talked about me as though I’ve never made a mistake and made me sound like Mao Tse-tung,” Yao said.
“The truth? I have failed many, many times. You probably will learn more about those times in this book than the things I have done right.”
China is changing in the face of global economics, Yao said.
In some ways China is becoming more like America, but I don’t think they will ever be the same. That means I live in two places - one that is very new and different to me, and one that is very old.”
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