Marjan Kalhor

As I was watching the Academy Awards last night, the award for "Best Director" caught my attention because this was the first time a female won the award in 82 years. Which reminded me of the 2010 Winter Olympics Iranian team. One athlete in particular: Marjan Kalhor. The opening ceremonies commented on how she was the first female winter olympic athlete for that country. That is amazing how far we as a world have come in the thousands of years that sports have been played all over the world. During the first Olympics, there weren't female athletes; that happened centuries later. Upon doing a little research into Iranian history, women have had positions of leadership and power, until the Islamic Revolutio when they lost some of those rights. However, over time, they have started to regain those rights in much the same way that Womens advocates in the USA have.
What I'm trying to reflect on is how amazed I was at Marjan Kalhor's involvement with the Winter Olympics. True, she finished in last place for both slaloms she participated in, but she participated. Her competing in the Winter Olympics may have inspired a great many more female athletes from her country to try and reach for something more than what's simply in front of them at the moment.



Sarah G
KIN 338I
Tu Th 2-315