Anna-Marie Ondaatje, a gymnast with Sri Lankan roots and eligible to represent the island, appears to be having some of her aspirations come true after a struggle that almost deprived her of a place at the Commonwealth Games now taking place in Gold Coast, Australia.
She was greeted by Prince Charles who shook her hand at the opening ceremony.
Canadian born Anna-Marie Ondaatje is also entitled to represent Sri Lanka by way of her parentage and chose not to accept any financial benefits from the sports ministry in Sri Lanka. She is the daughter of Alistair and Suzanne Ondaatje who hail from Wattala in downtown Colombo and is expected to make an impact at the Commonwealth Games with her next target to go for a medal in rhythmic gymnastics at the 2020 Olympics.
After some bolstering achievements at national level in Canada, Anna-Marie Ondaatje was invited by the Sri Lanka Gymnastics Association to represent the island at the 2018 Commonwealth Games and the upcoming Olympic Games in 2020 in Tokyo.
But a big problem cropped up when the Sri Lanka Gymnastic Association’s allocation for the Commonwealth Games was cancelled after it failed to send the entry list before the deadline expired.
It meant that all the Sri Lankan gymnasts, boys and girls numbering 10, were to be excluded. But following discussions by Hemasiri Fernando, the vice president of the Commonwealth Games Association Sri Lanka and the current National Olympic Committee (NOC) secretary Maxwell de Silva with the Commonwealth World Federation, it was decided to include female gymnasts based on what is said to be Gender Equality participation. Her first events in the Commonwealth Games are scheduled for April 11 and 12 which are the qualification rounds and the finals are slated for April 13.. She is the only Sri Lankan representative participating the Rhythmic gymnastics event and hopes to create history.
The Sri Lankan contingent to the Commonwealth Games consists of 80 athletes competing in 13 sports.
With his daughter able to make it to the Commonwealth Games, Alistair Ondaatje was all praise for Kamal Perera, the president of the Sri Lanka Gymnastics Association and Aruna Prasad, ex-president of the Association.
Ondaatje was nine years old when she first took to the sport and competed at the provincial and national level championships in Canada and also at multiple World Cups and international tournaments.
She most recently competed at the Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championship 2017 in Pesaro, Italy, which was her first international meet with the Sri Lanka flag.
Ondaatje won a bronze medal for Canada in the group event at the Pacific Rim Championships in 2014 and was also ranked in the Canadian group trails selection in 2016 for Team Canada.
Anna-Marie Ondaatje has been coached by Svetlana Joukova since 2016. Svetlana has been a rhythmic gymnastics coach for 15 years in Russia and 20 years in Canada and has been a national coach for the north American country since 1997.
In 2010, Svetlana’s junior team won the bronze medal at the first Youth Olympic Games in Singapore and during the same year her senior team won silver at the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.