‘GARLIC GIRLS’ NIGHTMARE
The South Korean Olympic finalists claim abuse and exploitation by coaches
THE South Korean women’s curling team were the unexpected heroines of last year’s Winter Olympics, but since their impressive run to the final they have endured a nightmare year.
Known as the “Garlic Girls” for their rural hometown where the pungent bulb is a speciality, all five have the surname Kim and use food-based nicknames to differentiate themselves.
Rank outsiders at the start of the Pyeongchang Games, they upset top teams Canada and Switzerland and shot to fame, with the wide glasses and trademark stare of skip Kim Eun-jung — known as “Annie“, after a yoghurt brand — inspiring viral memes online.
In the end, “Annie“, with “Pancake” Kim Yeong-mi, her sister “Steak” Kyeong-ae, “Chocho” Kim Cho-hi and “Sunny” Kim Seon-yeong, named after sunnyside up eggs, fell at the last hurdle and had to be content with silver — and national stardom.
But months later, they went public with allegations of abuse and exploitation by their coaches, part of a wide-ranging scandal that has engulfed South Korea’s sports establishment.
Sidelined from the national team and unable to take part in international competitions, the Garlic Girls have plummeted from seventh to 111th in the world rankings.
South Korea is a regional sporting power, regularly in the top-10 medal tables at the summer and winter Olympics.
But in an already intensely competitive society, winning is virtually everything in its elite sports community where coaches hold immense power over athletes’ careers.
Physical and verbal abuse are known to be rife — even in sports as little-known and poorly-funded as curling.
The team said their coaches verbally abused them countless times, had banned them from talking to other athletes, did not share how donation and prize money was being spent and censored their social media accounts and letters from fans.
The curlers were “miserable” and in a “desperate situation“, they wrote in a letter to the Korean Sports and Olympic Committee (KSOC), saying their human rights were “being violated.”
“We’ve reached a point where it has become unbearable,” they said.
The coaches resigned in December.
Before Pyeongchang, curling was largely unknown to South Korea, sports, as they are more close-knit and even isolated from the outside world,” he added.
“I think people were shocked not necessarily because of what the curlers revealed, but because they were such unexpected stars at the Pyeongchang games — so many Koreans were touched and felt proud because of them.”
In the face of the growing #MeToo movement, the government in January announced an enquiry into sexual and other abuses in sport, and increased penalties for violators.
“We need to walk away from the winning-at-all-costs philosophy,” said sports minister Do Jonghwan.