Two Chinese win at the Met's auditions

When Ao Li saw Manhattan's Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts - the home of the Metropolitan Opera House - for the first time, he cried.

The opera house "is like a dream for me", recalls Li, a bass baritone from Dezhou, Shandong province, who emerged as a winner in the prestigious Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions Grand Finals Concert. "The first time I saw the fountain, I was crying, because I watched a lot of productions on DVD and they all have the fountain (in the opening).

"It felt like a dream came true," the San Francisco resident says in an interview on New York classical music station WQXR. "The police came to me, and asked: 'Sir, you need help?' I was just too emotional."