On November 1st, the final competition and closing ceremony of the 12th Chinese Bridge Proficiency Competition for Foreign Secondary School Students was held in Zhengzhou.
Initiated by the CI of Vilnius University, Lithuania participated for the 3rd time, this year represented by student Austėja Obolevičiūtė from Vilnius Jesuit Gymnasium. Chinese Bridge Proficiency Competition is designed for secondary school students from all over the Word, with the purpose of deepening common knowledge of China and the Chinese language and celebrating cultural dialogue.
The "Chinese Bridge" Competition is carried out by Hanban in cooperation with local provincial and municipal governments and presented to the public through TV broadcast. This year after the first semifinal 30 participants out of 120 were selected to enter the finals.
After fierce competition in the finals, five champions, each representing one of the five continents were nominated: Zhao Jiaru from Australia, Gu Siyuan from Nigeria, Zheng Yanke from Italy, Liu Chenhuang from Indonesia and Qiu Meigu from the US. The contestants used their knowledge and skills in order to gain points and to win public sympathy. Each participant made an outstanding artistic performance, showcasing unique talents and representing their cultural traditions.
Although our participant did not qualify for the finals, but we are glad the Lithuanian representative participated. Thanks to Austėja, representing Lithuania and the girl herself talks about this experience:
“Chinese Bridge” is an amazing opportunity to find people from different cultures around the world. It was very interesting to watch the work of the media, especially TV broadcasting, also watching the work behind the scenes. We visited spectacular cultural sites in Beijing and Zhengzhou (Henan). I am very excited about visiting the Shaolin temple. We were involved in schools and universities activities, which helped a lot not only in finding out about culture and language but also about ordinary people's lives in China”.
We believe such kind of experiences will further encourage our gymnasium students to eagerly participate in the “Chinese Bridge” competition. After all, there is a great opportunity not only to get to know China, but also to establish a relationship with like-minded people from all over the World and to promote Lithuania to the international community.