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    Second meeting with Pasha in Sarstedt

    This year (1999) again, Pasha´s aunt organized a meeting for Pasha´s fans. While last time Tatjana took me along this time I actually got an e-mail from Pasha herself. I thought that was rather cute :-) The meeting took place in a building rather close to the one it was at last year. This time some girls actually came from other countries to see Pasha. Everything was nicely organized - I was rather surprised when Pasha´s aunt stopped her car immediately after noticing me to go and greet me - even remembering my name (!). The preceding this visit of Pasha´s to Germany the atmosphere was very relaxed. It started with a picture session with Pasha and her medals (the two GOLD Olympic ones and four GOLD World medals). After having been showered by flashes of cameras Pasha started talking a little telling us things she just wanted us to know. So, I'll try to make an adequate summary of this. One of the first things she talked about was L.A. She loves the city and said everyone should go there because to her it is a place where you can make your dreams come true if you have dreams. "LA is a huge cultural center, in which I'm in my element (dream). Here live so many great personalities, from whom everyone can learn. In this city you really live - every day, even every hour there come news, new meetings, new emotions...... Here I bec me more creative inspiration" . With going there she did not necessarily mean living there but also going for a holiday. Once for example when she walked along a street, she met Arnold Schwarzenegger going shopping with his family. She told us how stunned she was by this. That it took her some time to get used bumping into those world famous people (especially when they were doing these everyday things like shopping). I found that rather funny because I think there are loads of people feeling the same when they start bumping into figure skaters when they are off ice on competitions. She is being coached and choreographed now for singles skating - by Randy Gardner - and is having fun. "He is great!". On Tuesdays she has acting classes - she has to act a different kind of situation every time and likes that, too, I forgot the name of her teacher there, though - a problem when you do not take notes. Her goals jumpwise are doubles plus a triple Sal (she explicitly said she was not aiming for all triples). She hopes to be able to combine ice dancing with singles skating to create a different style and hopes for it being a positive influence to the current state of single´s skating. She will skate many shows (she mentioned Canada, Australia, Europa) and depending on how the training goes - she thinks she may have the triple ready in autumn - to compete at Pros at the beginning of next year (Jan or Feb).Skating is most important for her but when she stops skating professionally maybe in 5-10 years time, she would like to be an actress. Right now she is working on a program by the Gypsy Kings which she´ll probably perform with a fan and a long skirt that she can take off for the jumps. She said the music is really great because listening to it she can see a story unfold - it thus makes every step meaningful. She was still very exited about her role in "Beverly Hills 9190". So, she told us about that, too. First when she heard they had a role for a figure skater she thought she´d never get it but she still gave the audition a try. They seemed to like her and actually rewrote the role - so that she could play herself and not some figure skater. Pasha felt very honored by this. The filming was done in the rink where she trains so that made her feel a little less nervous. She was rather taken by surprise when she was asked to actually skate a program because she had only started to train as a singles skater very recently. Thus, she improvised to "Frozen" (in memory of the skating with Evgeny). Having all these actors around watching made her feel quite nervous and when they started clapping she said she blushed. Then two of the actors (I am not a 9190- specialist: Dennis or something else with a D??? and Luke or L-something????) came up to her and told her how touched they were by her skating that they had Goosebumps throughout and that they really are "straight" but they just had the urge to tell each other "I love you" when they saw her skate. One could see that Pasha was touched by this, too, and also amused. It was real fun to listen to Pasha. After her talking there was another picture break - this time outdoors. Then there was a little video session - we watched some of Pasha´s and Evgeny´s programs starting with their free dance at the Lillehammer Olypmics. I won´t go into detail here - I guess most figure skating fans know her programs anyhow. Pasha was wondering how the original ribbon of that Olympic medal looked like - as the program was just on when she told us she could not remember what it looked like - she just said something like "Oh, I think we will find out with this being on." - thus, we asked for it not being turned off before the medal ceremony. There were some nice "special features" - one showing parts from programs of Olympic ice dance champions with Evgeny and Pasha commenting on them (mostly that they influenced their skating in many ways) and other figure skating related things. And Povilas Vanagas then very nice commented on Pasha. And there was a German show after Nagano where she appeared at. German TV commentator called Pasha Ice- Goddess. And she asked her about her "rival" Angelika - if hings were really so tough and them in particular being "enemies". There Pasha said that the rivalry was only on the ice, that they are friends from childhood - and when she was asked why the newspapers wrote they hated each other - she commented that they needed stories to tell to make things more interesting to sell them for the readers. My personal favorite part, however, was when Pasha commented on the Olympic 98 free dance. It was just so funny!!! First she told us this little story before of what happened before the free dance. After the warm up they had to wait until they were to skate. So, in that time Evgeny started getting really nervous - he did not used to normally, however. Because Pasha herself was nervous, too, she thus decided not to look at him being white as the wall- but then she looked again he started to make crosses (?) and pray aloud. About then Tatiana Tarassova must have gotten worried too. So, she took a bottle of water and spilled it over Evgeny. He, of course was startled but managed to get a grip on himself. But by then Pasha was rather worried too (the pressure, problems with her wrist, etc.) and started crying. So Tarassova said to her "Do you want a bottle of water, too?" which made her pull herself together again. Still she said the first steps she took on the ice she was just thinking that she should not start to cry. Then she started commenting on the program itself - like the move they were most scared about because it did not work in practice ("I always got stuck when he tried to pull me through his legs."). The places of the program where they talked to each other ("Only one more lift! You are going to manage it!") - being each other's "psychiatrists". With one lift she commented "Here I thought: Now you are going to fall off!". And the point where she knew they had pulled the program through (she has her left hand in a fist - something she did not usually do when skating that program) - and the relief afterwards - eventhough she said she was sure they were going to win. Somewhere in between there was time to thank the sponsors FORTIS (who gave her a cosmonaut jacket and watch FORTIS and something else), take some more pictures, have her cut the cake, eat cake, etc. and also to chat with her (something I am not THAT good at, though. I told her I hope to see her skate some time - with her telling me that in autumn I may be able to - and that I like the idea of having some "ice dancing" in singles skating. I also asked her when she arrived (she was still jet lagged) how long she is going to be in Germany and she asked me to giver her a call while she is here etc.) But she was in Germany only 6 days. At last some more pictures and then she said good bye to everyone (as I mentioned she was rather jetlagged) and waved to me from the car before I left.

    Nathalie

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