Post by Helen on Mar 14, 2008 16:26:37 GMT 4
From: www.gymnasticgreats.com/
1979 team World Champion Melita Ruhn, attended the 25th anniversary of the Deva school.
Yesterday morning found an emotional 38-year old Melita Ruhn constantly smiling, perhaps in an attempt to hide the feelings she was experiencing when she came back to Deva. She always stops by the house of Angelica and Silviu Iacob, who were her tutors while she competed at Deva. “We always welcome her with open arms,” said the two retirees. A little before 10 am, when the 25th anniversary ceremony was scheduled to start, Melita was timidly stepping into the competition hall.
She first hugged Marilena Vladarau, her former teammate from 1979 when Romania won its first team gold medal at the Fort Worth Worlds. At the same competition, Ruhn won a bronze medal in the all-around and in the beam final. At the 1980 Olympic Games she won a silver medal with the team, and two bronze medals on bars and vault.
Melita retired from competitive gymnastics in 1982, when she was 17. She finished high school in her native Sibiu and left for Bucharest in 1984. She went to the sports university there, while also competing for her home club of CSS Sibiu for a short period. After she graduated college, she already had a boyfriend, Roland Fleischer, who immigrated to Germany with his family in 1988. They wanted to get married but the [Romanian Communist government] only gave them their approval 2 years later, so she only managed to leave Romania in 1990.
“I got to Germany, in a refugee camp near Nürnberg and stayed there for three moths. Six of us stayed in the same room, and Roland would come from the city to see me. Then we were allowed to move in together, but we didn’t have any furniture or dishes. Our first daughter, Stefi was born that year, and then it was a different struggle,” recalls Melita. Their hardships didn’t stop there. They needed money, so the former gymnast started working as a custodian.
Their second daughter, Francisca, was born in 1992. A year later, the Fleischers moved to Munich, where they still reside. Melita works in a school, where she owns a small store and teaches PE. Her husband is the school administrator. “Some of our friends from Sibiu are just one hour drive's away, so we visit them all day long,” said a smiling Melita. Life in Germany is anything but easy for the former gymnast, as she explains. “We wanted to own our own house, so in 1998, we borrowed 500,000 German marks from a bank, and now we keep thinking we’ll be old before we pay off our loan,” she said, adding that “we might come back to Romania when we retire.”
At the end of the ceremony, which took place at the Cultural Auditorium in Deva, Melita Ruhn and Marilena Vladarau met up with former team doctor Ioachim Oana. They hugged and exchanged a few greetings, before meeting up again at lunch. Three other gymnastic greats, considered symbols of the Deva school attended yesterday’s ceremony --Lavinia Milosovici, Simona Amanar and Maria Olaru.
The anniversary was an opportunity to unveil a bronze bust of Nadia Comaneci, done by Deva sculptor Ioan Seu. Nadia could not attend the ceremony, but sent a message. The director of the Deva sports club, Marinica Pirvanescu said they “are proud that along the mounted plaque certifying our status as a national college, we’ll also have Nadia among us thanks to this bust.” The organizers handed out diplomas to the celebrities that helped create and maintain the school for the past 25 years. The budget for the ceremony reached several tens of millions lei [10 million ~$300]
Running Away from Deva
In 1977. when she was 12 years old, Melita tried to run away from Deva as she recalls as her friend from Deva Angelica Iacob sits alongside. “I was upset because Karoly scolded me during training. I took a small bag and ran away from the training center. I thought about hitch-hiking and getting one of the trucks to take me home to Sibiu, “ said Melita. Next to her, Angelica Iacob confirms the story. “I found her at an intersection. No car had taken her.” During training, Angelica would bring Melita all sorts of goodies they weren’t allowed to eat. “I never forgot how good the pancakes, French fries and crème brulee we weren’t allowed to eat tasted,” added Melita.
Octavian Belu : “She was a model of discipline for myself and the rest of the team and her inner strength and energy were her best qualities in the struggle to be a high performance athlete.”
I won’t let my kids do gymnastics
After 11 years in which she’s been through all the ups and downs the sport has to offer, Melita says that her gymnastic days are only a memory. “I think about it sometimes, but they’re just memories. I don’t want my daughters to do gymnastics, because I know what sacrifices I made, so I took them to swimming, skiing or basketball.” She gets more emotional as she moves on to her next point. “Still, whenever I remember those unique moments, from the 79 Worlds when Romania won its first team world title, I get goose bumps. Beating the Soviet Union was a miracle.” Other memories are completely opposite. “I broke all the fingers on my hands, My legs, about 10 times from my knees and below. The worst fracture occurred before the Moscow Olympics, on my ankle. They put my ankle in a cast, and coach Karoly took it off before my vault. I scored a 10. It was incredible. Then, I put the cast back on my ankle,” she revealed.
1979 team World Champion Melita Ruhn, attended the 25th anniversary of the Deva school.
Yesterday morning found an emotional 38-year old Melita Ruhn constantly smiling, perhaps in an attempt to hide the feelings she was experiencing when she came back to Deva. She always stops by the house of Angelica and Silviu Iacob, who were her tutors while she competed at Deva. “We always welcome her with open arms,” said the two retirees. A little before 10 am, when the 25th anniversary ceremony was scheduled to start, Melita was timidly stepping into the competition hall.
She first hugged Marilena Vladarau, her former teammate from 1979 when Romania won its first team gold medal at the Fort Worth Worlds. At the same competition, Ruhn won a bronze medal in the all-around and in the beam final. At the 1980 Olympic Games she won a silver medal with the team, and two bronze medals on bars and vault.
Melita retired from competitive gymnastics in 1982, when she was 17. She finished high school in her native Sibiu and left for Bucharest in 1984. She went to the sports university there, while also competing for her home club of CSS Sibiu for a short period. After she graduated college, she already had a boyfriend, Roland Fleischer, who immigrated to Germany with his family in 1988. They wanted to get married but the [Romanian Communist government] only gave them their approval 2 years later, so she only managed to leave Romania in 1990.
“I got to Germany, in a refugee camp near Nürnberg and stayed there for three moths. Six of us stayed in the same room, and Roland would come from the city to see me. Then we were allowed to move in together, but we didn’t have any furniture or dishes. Our first daughter, Stefi was born that year, and then it was a different struggle,” recalls Melita. Their hardships didn’t stop there. They needed money, so the former gymnast started working as a custodian.
Their second daughter, Francisca, was born in 1992. A year later, the Fleischers moved to Munich, where they still reside. Melita works in a school, where she owns a small store and teaches PE. Her husband is the school administrator. “Some of our friends from Sibiu are just one hour drive's away, so we visit them all day long,” said a smiling Melita. Life in Germany is anything but easy for the former gymnast, as she explains. “We wanted to own our own house, so in 1998, we borrowed 500,000 German marks from a bank, and now we keep thinking we’ll be old before we pay off our loan,” she said, adding that “we might come back to Romania when we retire.”
At the end of the ceremony, which took place at the Cultural Auditorium in Deva, Melita Ruhn and Marilena Vladarau met up with former team doctor Ioachim Oana. They hugged and exchanged a few greetings, before meeting up again at lunch. Three other gymnastic greats, considered symbols of the Deva school attended yesterday’s ceremony --Lavinia Milosovici, Simona Amanar and Maria Olaru.
The anniversary was an opportunity to unveil a bronze bust of Nadia Comaneci, done by Deva sculptor Ioan Seu. Nadia could not attend the ceremony, but sent a message. The director of the Deva sports club, Marinica Pirvanescu said they “are proud that along the mounted plaque certifying our status as a national college, we’ll also have Nadia among us thanks to this bust.” The organizers handed out diplomas to the celebrities that helped create and maintain the school for the past 25 years. The budget for the ceremony reached several tens of millions lei [10 million ~$300]
Running Away from Deva
In 1977. when she was 12 years old, Melita tried to run away from Deva as she recalls as her friend from Deva Angelica Iacob sits alongside. “I was upset because Karoly scolded me during training. I took a small bag and ran away from the training center. I thought about hitch-hiking and getting one of the trucks to take me home to Sibiu, “ said Melita. Next to her, Angelica Iacob confirms the story. “I found her at an intersection. No car had taken her.” During training, Angelica would bring Melita all sorts of goodies they weren’t allowed to eat. “I never forgot how good the pancakes, French fries and crème brulee we weren’t allowed to eat tasted,” added Melita.
Octavian Belu : “She was a model of discipline for myself and the rest of the team and her inner strength and energy were her best qualities in the struggle to be a high performance athlete.”
I won’t let my kids do gymnastics
After 11 years in which she’s been through all the ups and downs the sport has to offer, Melita says that her gymnastic days are only a memory. “I think about it sometimes, but they’re just memories. I don’t want my daughters to do gymnastics, because I know what sacrifices I made, so I took them to swimming, skiing or basketball.” She gets more emotional as she moves on to her next point. “Still, whenever I remember those unique moments, from the 79 Worlds when Romania won its first team world title, I get goose bumps. Beating the Soviet Union was a miracle.” Other memories are completely opposite. “I broke all the fingers on my hands, My legs, about 10 times from my knees and below. The worst fracture occurred before the Moscow Olympics, on my ankle. They put my ankle in a cast, and coach Karoly took it off before my vault. I scored a 10. It was incredible. Then, I put the cast back on my ankle,” she revealed.