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Smiles hide regret of those left behind

When swimmer Lui Yan-yi was in Ireland she said she would consider giving her gold medal to Chan Hoi-chiu, her training partner left behind at home. But now she is back, she seems to be holding on tight to all three of her precious Dublin trophies.

Ah Chiu, 15, who has Down's Syndrome, made a special trip to the airport yesterday to welcome his friend Yan-yi, 13, home and gazed longingly at her medals. She won gold in the 50 metres freestyle event, silver in the 100 metres freestyle and team gold in the four-by-50 metres relay.

Both are pupils at the Mary Rose special school, Kowloon Tong, and had trained hard together for 18 months in preparation for the Special Olympic Games, swimming for two hours after school every day.

But because of the Irish government's insistence that the Hong Kong team could only attend the Games if members were quarantined in Macau for 10 days because of Sars, the team of 44 had to be cut to 22. Ah Chiu was one of the ones left behind.

'He was so disappointed, he was upset because he trained so hard,' his teacher, Chan Ngar-lai, said. 'It should have been him coming home to cheers today.'

David Ip Sio-wo, principal of the Mary Rose School and chairman of the Hong Kong Special Olympics, said: 'We did not want to leave anyone out from the original 44 but we could only take 22. With the trip stretched to 23 from 13 days, not enough volunteer coaches were available.'

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