Xiong'an trip impresses Xi's Iowa friends

Bonds go on

Luca Berrone, a board member of Iowa Sister States and a businessman, helped arrange the schedule for Xi's five-person delegation during the Iowa visit in 1985.

"I considered the five people from the 1985 visit not only my friends but my brothers, and they have allowed me to broaden my vision of global culture and friendship," he said.

Xi's visit in 1985 "cemented the foundation of the 40-year friendship between Iowa and Hebei province", Berrone said.

"The two weeks I spent together with President Xi and the other members of the delegation proved to be a life-changing experience for me, and continue to be a source of inspiration for improving relationships."

Guests such as Berrone have voiced their hopes and personal willingness to work to enhance subnational-level contacts and exchanges between the two largest economies in the world and to help improve the two nations' strained relations.

"We must continue to invest in friendship, because we cannot ever take it for granted.… Friendship can be hard work and not just idle talk," Berrone said.

Boosting networking between the younger generations of the two countries is also high on their agenda.

During their Hebei trip, the US guests visited Shijiazhuang Foreign Language School and attended a dialogue with students and faculty members there.

At the dialogue, students asked questions about the friendship between the peoples of China and the US, global agricultural issues, and exchanges between young Chinese and Americans.

Kenneth Quinn, former president of the World Food Prize Foundation and former US ambassador to Cambodia, responded to the students' questions.

Quinn hosted Xi in 1985, and in 1980, he helped arrange a tour of Iowa for a Chinese delegation headed by Xi's father, Xi Zhongxun, who was then governor of Guangdong province.

Quinn, a keen participant in academic contacts with Chinese scholars and students, underlined the necessity to pass friendship down to future generations.

"It's so important to have these exchanges for young students, and some exchanges allow Chinese students to come and spend a year going to high school someplace in the United States," Quinn said.

"When you're there for a year and you become part of a high school, it really sends them to connect with someone, makes them feel enough a part of America that a bond is formed. And I think it would be the same sending Americans to China, and feeling those attachments," he added.

Dan Stein, chairman of the Muscatine-China Initiatives Committee, said that some of the students from the Shijiazhuang school will visit Iowa during the fall, and some US students will come to China.

"The more people go back and forth, the more we can learn about each other and then find out more opportunities to cooperate together," he said.

Luo Yu and Stephanie Stone contributed to this story.

zhangyunbi@chinadaily.com.cn