The Hunan branch of the Hanban organized this year's Chinese Bridge event.

Famed folk singer Gong Linna and her German husband Robert Zollitsch perform at the opening ceremony.

Organized by the National Office for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language - or Hanban - over the past decade, the Chinese Bridge competition has become a major channel for foreign students to learn Chinese language and culture.

The first Chinese Bridge competition was held in 2002. More than 100,000 students from over 70 countries have since participated in the preliminary competitions in their home countries and more than 800 have competed in the finals in China.

The events have also been broadcast live to an audience of more than 100 million people overseas.

The Chinese Bridge has not only increased enthusiasm for learning Chinese and offered deeper understanding of China, it has also brought great changes to the careers and lives of participants.

An Italian girl named Malga participated the first competition in 2002 and is now a reporter at the Xinhua News Agency's Rome bureau.

She recalls her experience in the event, noting that "through communication with the Chinese people (in 2002), I found I love the country deeply".

"I'd like to link my career and life with China," she said.

Her passion was shared by Natasia, a Belarussian girl who competed in the sixth session. She is now a professional Chinese-Russian translator.

"Communication is important in people's lives and exchanges," Natasia said. "I like to help build bridge between the Chinese and Belarussian people."

According to Xu Lin, head of the Hanban, the influence of the Chinese Bridge program has gone beyond direct participants.

"Since the second session, many parents have been coming with their children to China. They also began to fall in love with the culture," she said, adding that "participants have also influenced their friends and classmates by talking about their experience in China".

Galal Walker, a professor at Ohio State University's department of East Asian languages and literature - who is also known by the Chinese name Wu Weike - is a prominent figure in promoting the Chinese Bridge and Chinese language teaching in the United States.

Walker is proud that his students have participated in every session of the Chinese Bridge finals in China.

During the past three decades, he taught Chinese language to about 2,700 students.

In addition to the Chinese Bridge, the Hanban's most important program is building Confucius Institutes - organizations that teach Chinese language and culture - in foreign countries.

There are now more than 300 Confucius Institutes in 96 countries. The number is expected to increase to 1,000 in 2020.

Information from the Hanban said about 50 million foreigners began to learn Chinese language in 2010, a figure estimated to grow to 150 million in 2020.

(China Daily 08/05/2011 page14)