The AFS program volunteers are experiencing Chinese culture. Photoed by Jiang Liying

A Group photo of volunteers from AFS program in Shijiazhuang    Photoed by Jiang Liying

    Chinese News Website Shijiazhuang April 5 (by Li Yang, Jiang Liying)
On the 5th of April, 17 volunteers of AFS program who are from 13 countries, including America, Australia, Germany, Italy and other counties, visited Shijiazhuang No. 42 Middle School for exchange.
    AFS is a non-profit organization for international cultural communication. Since its foundation in 1947, AFS international communication program aims at promoting the global communication, propelling the world peace and training the leaders with an international vision and the inter-culture communicative ability. Its main way to communicate is to stay at native families and also to learn in the native schools. Its characterization lies in the volunteers’ support and community service. It has held cultural communicative activities in 88 countries and the participants are almost 13,000, which can be added up to more than 420,000 until now, spreading to the whole world.
On that day, 17 volunteers visited school and joined a Chinese class as a foreign language and a P.E. lesson. The students from Shijiazhuang No.42 Middle School recited “Mu Gua” from “The Book of Songs” to show their cherishing for their friendship. David Blythe, a volunteer from America said that the travel to China was excellent and the foreign students’ performance was impressive. “The school has taught them so much which I have never expected because I thought they were only taught to learn language. While in fact, the school has taught them so much more about Chinese culture.”
    David Blythe said that it is a pleasure to see foreign students come to China to learn Chinese culture at such a good age and he hopes, this time, AFS can spread its own culture to China.
   The female volunteer from Argentina, Griselda Jara Veloso, said that there exist cultural differences between different countries. She hopes the foreign students can take advantage of this opportunity to learn Chinese culture and that they can have a better understanding about its custom, which is beneficial for them to deliver the friendship between two countries.
    During the interview, Darren Mudge, a volunteer from Australia said to reporter that when he communicated with foreign students, he knew that there were many lessons on Chinese culture in their school. “The foreign students can speak Chinese fluently and they also learnt Chinese culture, which can promote the development for the international education communication.”
    The vice president of Shijiazhuang No.42 Middle School, Zhang Xiuying said: “Since 2004, when our school joined this program, we have started to dispatch and also receive many students from AFS program, involving 13 different countries.”
    At the end of the interview, Zhang Xiuying told reporter that she is also one of the AFS volunteers and thanks to AFS, “We can go into the world and the world can also walk to us.”(End)