Worth more than gold

In my previous post, I've missed out the fact that last night was the Olympic badminton final match between Malaysia's Lee Chong Wei and China's Lin Dan. As the badminton is not being shown in Australia (unless you have Foxtel), it somehow slipped my mind. It was the only realistic chance of Malaysia bagging it's first ever Olympic gold medal. However, it did not pan out that way and the hunt continues.

Chong Wei lost in an agonizingly close defeat that took 3 sets of 21-15, 10-21, 19-21 in a battle of 79 minutes. He was clearly heartbroken and the picture of him - courtesy of The Star holding back his tears at the medal presentation says it all. This would definitely be his last Olympic games, and it seem unlikely that we would be able to produce another badminton champion within the next 4 years to take on the mighty China giants.

But what touched me was the floodgates of support and backing from Malaysians from Facebook, Twitter and any social media possible. We were all behind Chong Wei. Put aside our racial, cultural and political differences. It doesn't matter that he didn't win the gold medal. Chong Wei has reunited the whole nation. And that is worth more than gold.

Dato' Lee, I'm proud of you. And I'm sure the whole nation is too.