US environmentalist, educator arrives back in Henan

Ronald Sakolsky, a retired United States educator whose decades-old bond with Chinese desertification-control pioneer Yin Yuzhen went viral on social media this year, arrived in Henan province on Thursday afternoon.

His visit to the province where he once taught English as a volunteer follows an emotional reunion with Yin earlier this week in Ordos, Inner Mongolia autonomous region.

Former colleagues, local officials, journalists and assorted well-wishers greeted Sakolsky at the airport in the provincial capital of Zhengzhou as he made his way to Luoyang, where he taught at a middle school in 1999.

Some locals held signs reading "Welcome Home, Mr Ronald Sakolsky", while one red placard bore his Chinese name, "Long Fu". Sakolsky was presented with bouquets as media crews captured the scene.

Visibly moved after stepping into the arrival hall at the airport, Sakolsky told reporters he never expected to return to Henan.

"I can't express my feelings because I never thought I would be coming back," he said.

Many of the local people he befriended decades ago now have their own families, he added.

"I gave their children English names. I haven't seen them for ages. They are married now and have children," he said.

Asked which Luoyang dish he had missed most during his years away, Sakolsky did not hesitate.

"No doubt, jiangmiantiao," he said, referring to the city's beloved fermented noodle snack.

"I could eat it for breakfast, lunch and dinner at school every day."

His four-day tour of Luoyang will include a visit to the local museum and meetings with teachers and students at Luoyang No 2 Foreign Language School, where he once taught. He is due to depart the city on Sunday and leave China on Tuesday.

Sakolsky and Yin's story began in 1999. Teaching English in Henan under a China-US teacher exchange program organized by the China Education Association for International Exchange, Sakolsky was moved by a television report on Yin's efforts to turn the Maowusu desert green.

He raised $5,000 to support her afforestation work — a sum that helped transform barren land into a forest of more than 50,000 trees.

Sakolsky arrived in Ordos on Sunday to meet with Yin for the first time in 26 years. Their emotional reunion, widely anticipated since Yin's online search for him went viral in May, has been hailed as a testament to friendship between the people of China and the US.