For Adam Dong, badminton is more than just the sport he played at the Olympics in Paris.
It’s the sport he’s been enamoured with since he was a child, the thing that helped him overcome the culture shock of immigrating from China, and the reason he met his wife.
“I can’t really live without it,” the 30-year-old from Burlington, Ont., told CBC Hamilton.
Dong and his badminton partner Nyl Yakura previously won gold for men’s badminton doubles at the Pan American Games in Santiago, Chile in 2023, but are now leaving Paris after being eliminated from the preliminary phase of the Olympic badminton doubles tournament.
“I think we tried our best and that’s a good experience for us as well,” Dong said.
“The Olympics are just totally different from any other competition … it’s a lifelong memory and experience.”
‘He found belonging in Canada through his badminton’
Dong said his lifelong fixation on badminton began when he was six-years-old when Zhang Jun — a player from his hometown of Suzhou, China — won Olympic gold in Sydney, Australia in 2000.
From 2006 to 2014, Dong played with one of the top professional teams in China.
Afterwards, he moved to Canada to attend Humber College in Toronto.
That’s where he met longtime friend Mark Huang.
Huang said Dong faced culture shock when he arrived in Canada and a language barrier.
But Huang said the sport Dong loves most is how he overcame those barriers — and is how he met the love of his life Belinda Zhang.
“In a way, he found belonging in Canada through his badminton,” Huang said.
Family inspired Dong despite sport forcing them apart
Dong and Zhang now have two children together, ages two and four.
But Dong’s Olympic dreams, which formed roughly three years ago, have also come at a cost.
“It’s a very hard three years for the whole family because we have been apart from each other for the majority of time,” Zhang said.
On top of the emotional toll of being away from family, he also had to pay for most of his own travel.
Dong credits the support he got from his wife, as well as the other messages of support on social media, for getting him through the journey.
“She actually did a lot for me, especially for this Olympic role, because it takes a lot of courage for both of us,” he said.
“She’s the backbone of our family.”
After he returns home, Dong said he plans on resting before continuing his coaching work at the Lions Badminton Training Centre in Burlington.
He opened it in 2018 and his wife works there as a manager when she isn’t busy as a realtor.
“Right now we just want to kind of relax,” Dong said.
But no amount of relaxing will pull Dong away from the sport.
“Badminton is just kind of part of my body, part of my life. Everything I do is around badminton,” he said.