'Extraordinary showcase'

TV host and entrepreneur Yue-Sai Kan says the Winter Olympics will be a good opportunity for the world to understand China more, Minlu Zhang reports in New York.

From the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics to the 2010 Expo Shanghai and to the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, Yue-Sai Kan is a witness to international events. When talking about the upcoming 2022 Winter Olympics, Kan is full of enthusiasm. The Chinese have a certain pride when it comes to this kind of global event, Kan says.

"I remember when they first announced the Winter Olympics to be held in China. It created such excitement among people, particularly young people. The young people are the most excited about winter sports," she says. "I bet you anything we have about 300 million Chinese that are engaged in winter sports (today). That is just totally amazing."

Kan often travels around China. From the time when people in China came into contact with winter sports for the first time to the upcoming Winter Olympics in China today, Kan has witnessed the rapid development of the country and profound changes in social life. The way people lead a healthy life is becoming more and more diverse.

"China is growing so much, everything then and now-it's like two different worlds. I remember there were hardly any real winter sports, maybe ice skating, but today there are 700(winter sports) resorts in China. That's really amazing," Kan says.

At her home in the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York, Kan is wearing a red sweater and red earrings. Her eyes are gleaming with energy and she is always smiling when she looks at you. Kan, an Emmy-winning television host and producer who created the Yue-Sai cosmetics brand, which became China's leading cosmetics company, was once called "the most famous woman in China" by People magazine, and Time magazine proclaimed her "the queen of the Middle Kingdom".

In the 1970s, Kan created her first major TV production Looking East, which was the first of its kind to introduce Asian culture and customs to a growing and receptive American audience. The New York Times said the TV program "bridges the East and West".