Famed Chinese Bridge tourney draws record number of students
Test of language, cultural proficiency attracts contestants from 118 countries, Li You reports.
The Chinese Bridge competition, an annual event held for foreign students to test their proficiency in Chinese language and culture, ended on Saturday in Changsha, capital of Hunan province.
Organized by the Confucius Institute, the Office of Chinese Language Council International and the Hunan provincial government, the competition was themed “Communication between China and Foreign Countries”, and attracted a total of 152 contestants from 118 countries around the world.
According to statistics provided by its organizers, the number of the competitors this year set a new record, and their knowledge of Chinese language and culture was an improvement on those in previous years.
During the competition, the rivals were divided into several groups based on the continents they came from. They answered the questions on a special machine and their final scores determined who was eligible to enter the semifinal and finals of the event.
On July 10, after an intense round of questions, the list of top 30 players was unveiled. Among them were four from Oceania, six from Africa, six from the Americas, seven from Europe and seven from Asia.
On July 17, those 30 players battled for the top 15 positions. And on July 27, after a series of themed competitions, Theodore Joseph from Oceania, Vivi from Asia, Anthony Ebuka from Africa, Ruslan Ustinov from Europe and John Gardner from the Americas became the five finalists.
For the first time in the competition, this year’s Chinese Bridge took place in an onstage “classroom”, where the top 30 players wore their school uniforms and were seated on study chairs.
Chen Ming, the host of the “classroom”, said: “Though the topics this year were very difficult, involving Chinese history, geography, culture and current issues, the contestants were capable of dealing with them calmly. The competitors’ proficiency in Chinese language and culture went far beyond my imagination.”
Those providing the questions included Li Xiaoxuan from Peking University, Jiang Nan and Wang Shuai, a crossborder couple, and Richard Sears, who is widely known as “Uncle Hanzi(Chinese character)” in China.
Sears is the founder of a Chinese etymology website, which provides information about the origin of Chinese characters. A 68-year-old US citizen, he has been obsessed with the Chinese language for more than 40 years.
The competitors’ proficiency in Chinese language and culture went far beyond my imagination.” Chen Ming,
Since 1994, he has devoted himself to the digitalization of Chinese characters and has spent almost all of his savings on their pursuit.
So far, his website has compiled some 96,000 ancient Chinese characters and has analyzed 8,105 simplified characters, tracing them back to traditional characters and components.
Alistair Bayley, champion of the 2012 Chinese Bridge competition, also helped develop questions for this year’s event. Returning to the stage of Chinese Bridge was an exciting experience, he said.
“When I saw the players on the stage, it reminded me of myself in 2012. Because of the Chinese Bridge, I made friends from all over the world, which changed the trajectory of my life,” Bayley said.
This was the 11th year for the competition to be held in Changsha, and for most of the 152 players, it was their first visit to the city. They savored the local culture and visited places of interest, including the Yuelu Academy, one of the most renowned schools in ancient China.
In recent years, with the global craze for learning the Chinese language, Confucius Institute classrooms are springing up all over the world, providing a platform for people to learn Chinese.
College students are in the forefront of people learning Chinese, and the number of players in the Chinese Bridge competition has been increasing year by year.
As a result, the competition has become an annual demonstration of the power of “folk diplomacy” as players engross themselves in the study of Chinese culture and make friends with their peers around the world.