History was made yet again at the 2018 Winter Olympics this year. No, I’m not talking about Nathan Chen’s five quads in one single figure skating program or Adam Rippon’s fabulous embrace of being the first openly gay Olympian. I’m talking about the appearance of North Korea at the Olympics. Until this recent Olympics, North Korea was never thought of when it came time to celebrate the ability of the top world athletes. For so long North Korea has been on the outside of all contact, leaving the world to ponder what exactly happened within North Korean borders.
Now in 2018, the world is catching a small glance at what North Korea has to offer. For the first time, Northern and Southern Koreans appeared together under a unified flag at the Olympics. However, it should be noted that this Olympics is not the first games the country has competed in. In fact, North Korea has attended the majority of the summer Olympics and has even taken away two gold medals from the games.
This year is significant because in addition to showing up and celebrating the Olympic opening the two countries are combining their women’s hockey teams. In fact, the women’s ice hockey team has so far competed in five ice hockey games as a unified north and south team. Some fans and spectators saw this union of the teams as a physical symbol of hope for a future reunification of the country.
The team played a total of five games with each other, which they lost. The last game was on Tuesday against Sweden with a score of 6-1. However, it is not the score that matters in these games for the Korean team, rather it’s what happens off of the ice. Rather than being focused on the score, the team, the fans, and the coaches were emotional not because they lost but because they accomplished something together. With such politicized coverage of North, this is extremely remarkable.
Even the fans that were in the stands of the hockey game celebrated the team for their good spirits while cheering on the sense of community they had created. Even though reunification of North and South Korea has been in a contentious debate since the end of World War II, this Olympics can be read as a small victory in hopefully future peace between the two countries.
