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Associated Press

Gaurika Singh was thrust into the international spotlight as the youngest athlete at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, where she captivated people with her story of earthquake survival.
She is still only 15 but at the Asian Games, where’s she competing in swimming this week, she feels almost like a veteran.
Singh is not even the youngest member of the Nepal swimming team in Jakarta, as she is two months older than teammate Tisa Shakya. And there are competitors on other national teams who haven’t even reached their teens – the youngest at the games being nine-year-old Indonesian skateboarder Aliqqa Novvery.
“I’m happy not to be the youngest this time because it kind of helps,” Singh said. “There’s less spotlight so you can focus on just swimming.”

“There was a lot of media attention,” she added, recalling the Olympics in 2016 when she was aged 13. “It was fun but it was tiring.”
Still, in context, it was nothing compared with her experience of the April 2015 earthquake that killed 9,000 people and damaged nearly 1 million houses and structures in Nepal.
She was preparing for the national championships in Kathmandu when the massive quake struck.
Asian Games: Hong Kong swimmers win bronze in women’s 4x100m freestyle relay
Singh was in a five-story office block at the time and took shelter under a desk. Luckily, the building she was in did not collapse.
“It was very scary,” she said. “My mum was with me but it was terrifying.”
She may just be a teenager but she is packed a lot into her years and that experience helped shape her view of the world. When she is done with swimming, she hopes to work for the United Nations. For now, though, she is focused on competing.

There were only two Olympic-size swimming pools in Nepal before the 2015 quake and one of those was ruined and has not been rebuilt. The one remaining pool is outdoors, which means it freezes over in winter.
So Singh is the only member of the Nepal swimming team at the Asian Games who gets to swim all year round because she moved to Britain with her parents, who are doctors, when she was two.
Asian Games: day two updates from Jakarta and Palembang
She goes back to the Himalayas every summer to train with the national squad but practices at her base in England the rest of the time.
“I just love representing Nepal. It’s a great honour,” Singh said. “This is the first international meet after Rio so it’s just fun getting back to all of this.”


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Asian Games 2018

Asian Games: 15-year-old swimmer Gaurika Singh loves representing Nepal but happy not to be youngest like at Rio 2016

Nepal's Gaurika Singh reacts after her woman's 100m freestyle heat at the 18th Asian Games in Jakarta. Photo: AP

Nepal's Gaurika Singh swims during a warm-up session head of day two of the swimming competition at the 18th Asian Games in Jakarta, Indonesia, Monday, Aug. 20, 2018. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)

KATHMANDU, NEPAL - APRIL 28: A view from an adjacent rooftop shows the destruction left by the April 25 earthquake of Inachok, an area of Bhaktapur on April 28, 2015 in Bhaktapur, Nepal.

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Team has only one Olympic size pool in Kathmandu to train in after 2015 earthquake ruined the other and it is yet to be rebuilt


Asian Games: 15-year-old swimmer Gaurika Singh loves representing Nepal but happy not to be youngest like at Rio 2016

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Team has only one Olympic size pool in Kathmandu to train in after 2015 earthquake ruined the other and it is yet to be rebuilt

Team has only one Olympic size pool in Kathmandu to train in after 2015 earthquake ruined the other and it is yet to be rebuilt