After finishing her fourth Winter Games in Sochi, Kikkan Randall decided: It was time to have a baby. But the cross-country skiing champion wasn’t ready to give up her Olympic goals.   So, at 32, she looked at the calendar and plotted her window: 2016, a gap year. No World …

American skier Mikaela Shiffrin won the gold medal in the women’s giant slalom event Thursday at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics in South Korea. Shiffrin beat Norway’s Ragnhild Mowinckel by nearly four-tenths of a second on her final run to win her second career Olympic gold medal, following her triumph in …

As competition day gets closer, Nigeria’s bobsled team members say they are super excited about their Winter Olympic debut in Pyeongchang, South Korea. The team, which is making history as Africa’s first bobsled team to compete in the Winter Games, is led by Nigerian-American Seun Adigun, a hurdler who represented …

Human Rights Watch has said world soccer’s governing body must tackle rights abuses in Russia’s Chechnya region now that one of the teams in this year’s World Cup in Russia has chosen Chechnya as the location for its base camp. Rights groups and Western governments allege that the authorities in …

Carlos Campos arrived in the U.S. when he was 13 years old – alone and undocumented – but now the Honduran fashion designer and his elegant collections are a staple of New York’s Fashion Week. Fashion Week runs thru 2/16. Faith Lapidus has more. …

Wang Zhuyin studies 10 hours a day preparing for a series of tests to obtain a U.S. physician’s license. But like millions of young Chinese adults, the 26-year-old has found a new way to cope with the pressure: an online game about a frog.   A frog that’s perpetually on …

Erin Entrada Kelly’s “Hello, Universe,” a nuanced account of a diverse group of middle school students and their unexpected encounters, has won the John Newbery Medal for the outstanding children’s book of 2017. The Randolph Caldecott Medal for best illustration went to Matthew Cordell and his near-wordless story of a …

A Catholic nun waits eight hours each day at a folding table, ready for a call but praying nothing has happened to cause the phone to ring. Her office, the “Gender Equality Support Center,” a tiny trailer tucked between a bathroom and a police post under the ski lift at …

Dallas Brown can still see the bullets coming for him 50 years later, smacking into the dirt at his feet as north Vietnamese soldiers fired on his platoon during an ambush deep in the jungle.   Minutes later, as the deadly firefight wound down, Brown and his fellow soldiers in …

Vic Damone, whose mellow baritone once earned praise from Frank Sinatra as “the best pipes in the business,” has died in Florida at the age of 89, his daughter said.   Victoria Damone told The Associated Press in a phone interview Monday that her father died Sunday at a Miami …

A drag queen is headlining the parade of one of Rio de Janeiro’s most storied samba schools Monday night as Carnival celebrations across the country continue the tradition of ridiculing cultural icons and pushing social boundaries. Pabllo Vittar will perform with Beija-Flor de Nilopolis, whose theme is promoting tolerance. Last …

Journalist and writer Helen Thorpe spent one school year in a classroom with immigrant and refugee students from various cultures who were just learning to speak English. She watched them overcome challenges and work hard to succeed in school and beyond. Thorpe shares their stories in a new book, The …

The Winter Olympics are supposed to be cold, of course. Just maybe not THIS cold. Wind and ice pellets left Olympic snowboarders simply trying to stay upright in conditions that many felt were unfit for competition, the best ski jumpers on the planet dealing with swirling gusts and biathletes aiming …

The lawyers for the daughter of late French rocker Johnny Hallyday say she plans to contest her father’s will, which leaves all his property and artistic rights “exclusively” to his widow Laeticia. Laura Smet was said to have discovered the contents of Hallyday’s will “with amazement and pain” in a …

Author, actress and activist Eve Ensler has dedicated her life and work to women’s issues around the world. She’s spent years visiting war zones and developed a special connection with victims of rape and torture in the Democratic Republic of Congo when she was invited there in 2007. “I think …

As the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics get underway in South Korea, here in the U.S., a group of schoolchildren is hitting the slopes in Vernon, New Jersey, enjoying the expensive sport of skiing for the very first time thanks to a non-profit foundation. Faiza Elmasry has this story narrated by Faith …

Four years ago, American skaters Mirai Nagasu and Adam Rippon were upset that they failed to make the Olympic team. They drowned their sorrow in hamburgers that they ate on the roof of Nagasu’s house, Rippon told NBC News.  Now, the 24-year-old Nagasu and Rippon, who is 28, are roommates …

Forget the Winter Olympics, the Champion’s League or the Super Bowl. The real competition right now is who’s going to be invited to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding. Everyone who is anyone in Britain is angling for an embossed royal ticket. British heavyweight boxer Anthony Joshua, who is seeking …

Ziad Doueiri’s film ‘The Insult’ is one of this year’s Oscar nominees in the Foreign Film category. The film, largely a courtroom drama, tackles the cultural, religious and political rifts that exist in Lebanon since 1948. Doueiri spoke with VOA’s Penelope Poulou about the film’s hard-hitting elements and its message …

Ziad Doueiri’s film The Insult is one of this year’s Oscar nominees in the Foreign Film category. The film, largely a courtroom drama, tackles the cultural, religious and political rifts that have existed in Lebanon since 1948. Doueiri told VOA about the film’s hard-hitting elements and its message of reconciliation …

A teenager has won the first U.S. medal at the Pyeongchang Olympics, and it’s gold. Seventeen-year-old Red Gerard, from Silverthorne, Colorado, in his debut Olympics, won the men’s slopestyle snowboarding competition. “My emotions are crazy,” he said after winning. “I was just so happy to land the run and to …

A teenager has won the first U.S. medal at the Pyeongchang Olympics, and it’s gold. Seventeen-year-old Red Gerard, from Silverthorne, Colorado, in his debut Olympics, won the men’s slopestyle snowboarding competition. “My emotions are crazy,” he said after his win. “I was just so happy to land the run and …

High winds have led Pyeongchang Olympic officials to postpone the men’s downhill skiing event planned for Sunday. Winds were gusting to 72 kph (45 mph) at the Jeongseon Alpine Center. The event will now be held Thursday. The men’s super-G and other speed racing events will be moved back a …

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder” — an old saying that often elicits groans — is just what organizers of an exhibition of 20th and 21st century photographic masterpieces at the Musée de l’Élysée in Lausanne believe and are promoting. The exhibit, “The Beauty of Lines,” exposes 160 …

The exhibit features 160 photographs from the New York-based Sondra Gilman and Celso Gonzalez-Falla collection …