Welcome Home: Russian Athletes Return From Olympic Games to Patriotism and Praise
We're coming back to the first topic of our release: the return of our athletes home from Pyeongchang. My colleague Olga Skobeeva flew in on the same plane. Right now, she's at the Sheremetyevo Airport to witness everything. The athletes are greeting their families and fans.
- Olga, if you can hear us, please tell us what's happening in the arrivals area.
- Hello, Ernest, I can hear you! Right now, the Russian athletes, as we can refer to them now, instead of "the Olympic athletes from Russia", our Russian athletes started greeting their fans. Let's see how they met the first one, right after they saw him. Let's see what their reaction was.
"Russia! Russia! Russia! Russia! Russia! Russia! Russia!"
Here he comes. You can hear many people with flags shout "Russia".
I can see Alena Zavarzina with her American husband, Vic Wild, who acquired Russian citizenship.
But look who is next to me. Our wonderful Elistratov who brought us the very first medal at the Pyeongchang Olympics.
- Congratulations! Semen, how are you? How was your flight? How does it feel finally to have the Russian flag on your uniform?
Semen Elistratov: Everything is just fine, thank you! We're finally home. It was the only thing I've been thinking about in the past few days: coming home and finally eating Russian food because I got sick and tired of the rice.
- Borscht and pelmeni?
- Of course, borscht, pelmeni, and salo.
- Thank you!
Semen Elistratov, who brought us our first bronze medal in Pyeongchang.
We continue greeting our athletes. Now, right here, there is a lot of people with flowers and flags. Their T-shirts and hoodies read: "Red Machine". I hope you can see us greeting out Russian team here at Sheremetyevo right now.
Olga Skobeeva showed people greeting our Russian athletes at the Sheremetyevo Airport. She came by the same plane from Pyeongchang.