Classmates savor moment in history in Shanghai

Yang Hongjia, a sophomore at the University of Virginia, or UVA, had a class during his first academic year on the Shanghai Communique, a historic document that set the foundation for the normalization of relations between China and the United States.

He and a classmate decided to pay a visit to the Jin Jiang Hotel in Shanghai, where the groundbreaking document was issued on Feb 28, 1972.

Though a student of a US university, Yang was then taking courses at the Center for American Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai. Due to travel bans with the pandemic, Yang, along with some 80 other Chinese students enrolled at the UVA, studied on campus at Fudan University in Shanghai and Peking University in Beijing, both partner universities of the Virginia university, for the 2020-21 academic year.

During their visit to the hotel, Yang said he and his classmate had afternoon tea and took pictures at the auditorium where the communique was published.

"We were so excited as we immersed ourselves in the exact place where history took place to experience the ice-breaking moment of the relationship between the two countries," said Yang.

The year at Fudan has offered Yang an international perspective for his academic study.

"Looking back, I found the experience in Shanghai extremely helpful. It let me understand my country well before I came to the US. I had the opportunity to compare the education systems between the two countries, as well as the differences of the two societies through both Chinese and American perspectives."

Justin O'Jack, chief representative of the University of Virginia in China, said the university's cooperation with Chinese partner universities "really helped us survive the most critical part of the early days of the pandemic in 2020".

O'Jack, who is based in Shanghai, considers cooperation between Chinese and US universities and people-to-people exchanges as good examples of upholding the Shanghai Communique.

"I was rereading the Shanghai Communique these days, and was reminded that one of the foundation areas of collaboration between China and the US was in the areas of academic, sports, journalism and other people-to-people exchanges," said O'Jack, who participated in a commemoration meeting for the 50th anniversary of the historic document on Monday.

He noted that in 1978 the first group of 52 Chinese scholars went to visit the US, and now the figure for Chinese scholars and students in the US has risen to more than 372,500.

During his year of study at Fudan, Yang said he participated in many activities and discussions with US students enrolled at the university and befriended many of them.

"I felt that the friendships at the individual level are not easily affected by the tension between countries, and those friendships are like sparks which can one day light a brighter future of the China-US relationship," he said.