Incheon: ‘Life after sport’ seems to be a key phrase during the 2014 Incheon Asian Games.

Earlier this week, Shaikh Ahmad Bin Fahad Al Sabah, President of the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA), made time to deliver the keynote address at an International Sports Relations (ISR) Foundation Forum held on the sidelines of the Asian Games.

In his speech, Shaikh Ahmad spoke on the importance of the career transition from being a top-level athlete to a making an entry into normal, everyday life. He stressed that one of the main concerns of the Olympic Movement was assisting full-time athletes in their quest to find suitable sports-related jobs once they bring down the curtain on their sporting careers.

He also lauded the ISR Foundation for doing so much work in moving this initiative forward.

The idea of motivating sportspersons to participate in the decisions of the Olympic Movement was first moved by former IOC president, the late Juan Antonio Samaranch. Now former athletes are now part of the decision-making process in the sport they once competed.

Local photo exhibit

The IAGOC — the local organisers of the Incheon Asian Games — are sponsoring a photo exhibition that explores the beauty of the port city’s mud flat plains.

Titled ‘Incheon with mysterious tidal flats’, the exhibition displays 55 photographs of the city’s iconic mud flats, which were designated to be “of international importance” by the Ramsar Convention in July this year.

The exhibition was opened last week at the Namdong Sorae Arts Hall in south Incheon and will run till the conclusion of the Games on October 5.

The photographs on display have been taken by well-known South Korean photographer Choi Byung-kwan, who is best known for his work on capturing the natural landscape around the demilitarised zone, the tightly-controlled border between the two Koreas.

Among the works on display are pictures of black-faced spoonbills, a native to Incheon but facing near extinction. The aim of the exhibition is to show the contrast between the fast-developing port city of Incheon and the fragile ecosystem and natural beauty of Korea.