Kim Zmeskal & Betty Okino - Vignette - 1991 McDonald's American Cup

[@abbieprice3430]

I’ll betcha Betty was one of the first mixed race gymnasts who made it to the Olympics! Being half Ugandan and half Romanian must’ve given her and her siblings the best of both cultures growing up!

[@shardyshaw]

Man i love Betty

[@arfriedman4577]

Nice interview. I like how Betty knew what Bella was saying and he didnt know she spoke that language. I might have seen this interview years ago because i vaguely recall kim stating she was good friends with betty.

[@susandilaudo9534]

Thats one of my favorite interviews/stories. Hilarious. Romanian is such a random language to know. Hahah

[@ccutehoney]

It’s a Romance language so its actually one of the most common language families and if anyone that speaks Spanish, French, Portuguese, Italian can pretty much pick up most of the words. Honestly English is one of the weirdest and least like any other language out there

[@koolaidman6251]

it's not so funny when you know that Bela and Marta were saying racist things about Betty and she understood every word!

[@jraaccounts]

her mother is romanian, so it’s… completely not random at all for her to speak romanian?

[@metsdudenj]

@@ccutehoney actually not so true, because I speak 2 of those and dont understand Romanian

[@b0rtie]

@@ccutehoney ​ I can sense the snootiness in your comment, but you’re incorrect. English is a Germanic language, and it has influences from Latin as well. So it definitely isn’t the weirdest language out there. For many English speakers, learning German and Dutch would make sense since they’re from the same family of languages. If anything, Romanian is the outlier of all the Romance language because it has heavy Slavic influence and has retained some declension rules from Latin, unlike other Latin based languages like Italian, French, and Spanish. While it may be a Romance language with a lot of similar words, it may seem very strange to Italian, French and Spanish speakers.

[@htownhomie06]

okino had better compulsories. and with her upgrades, the '91 national AA title would've been hers for the taking.

[@snopesshop1903]

The abuse they suffered...

[@37tonya]

Ugh. Those leotards make them look like dyed easter eggs....LOL.