Goodbye and dosvidanya, friends

The Moscow-Utah Youth Games ended Saturday with an elaborate closing ceremony at Cauldron Park. But nobody seems ready to say goodbye or even dosvidanya.

In a speech at the evening ceremonies, Moscow Deputy Mayor Mikhail Men chose to say, "See you in Moscow!"

Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov and then-Gov. Mike Leavitt dreamed up the idea of the games during the 2002 Olympics — giving Utah youths a chance to compete in Moscow last summer and bringing Russian youths here for the past week.

At the conclusion, organizers already were looking to repeat and extend the games. Ideas bandied about include repeating the games every few years, including other Olympic cities such as Vancouver or Sydney, including other sports and including other ages.

"We've always said the mayor and the governor would get together after the winter games and talk about the future of the games," said youth games co-chairman David Winder.

Vancouver and Beijing also have expressed interest in getting involved.

A conversation scheduled for a Saturday night dinner between Gov. Olene Walker and Luzhkov took place instead with Men, after Luzhkov cut short his trip to return home after the Moscow subway bombing Friday.

"There is every intention of continuing this in some form or other, (but) it's kind of a little bit up in the air right now," Russian Honorary Consul General Rusty Butler said.

As for the bombing "we wouldn't stop the competition," Men said. "We had to prove to the terrorists that life goes on."

Making connections

If Utahns were looking for athletic excellence in the winter games to make up for their somewhat poor showing in the summer, they would have been disappointed. The Russians again dominated in most sports.

As organizers are fond of noting, however, a city drawing athletes from a population of 12 million vs. a state drawing from 2.4 million — well, you do the math. Nevertheless, Utah officials had expected to do better in the winter games because of the mountains and Olympic venues easily accessible for training in Utah.

"Our Utah athletes are losing too much," Butler said. "That wasn't the plan."

But, Butler hastened to add, the primary purpose of the games — intercultural exchange — was fulfilled in spades.