More differences mean you need more exchange programs

Waikiki today looks exactly the same as it did in 1993 when, during my first trip to the United States, I had spent a year completing the Freedom Forum Fellowship for Journalists in Asian Studies at the University of Hawaii in Manoa. It was Asian studies for the six American journalists in the program, but for me and a fellow Japanese journalist, it was very much about US studies.

As someone who cared a lot about developments in the US and China-US relations, it was an eye-opening year for me. The Bill Clinton-Al Gore administration had just taken office. I remember vividly the day when Clinton apologized to the native Hawaiians for the US overthrowing of the Hawaiian kingdom in 1893. And I remember the day when Gore made a passionate speech about the information superhighway — the internet that has since changed the world.

While learning a great deal from classes ranging from US studies and economics to sociology and Japanese studies, I enjoyed the seminars at the East-West Center, then headed by Michel Oksenberg, a well-known China hand. I also attended many China seminars at the Maple Garden restaurant hosted by the late professor Daniel Kwok, who was the director of my program. He passed away a year ago and the Maple Garden Chinese restaurant was also closed last year.

Years later, when I interviewed China scholars Thomas Rawski at the University of Pittsburgh and Nicholas Lardy at the Peterson Institute in Washington, I told them that their writings were my assigned readings back in 1993.

China-US relations, which had suffered a major setback a few years earlier, were on a path of recovery. It was toward the end of my program in May 1994 when Clinton announced the decision to delink the renewal of China's most favored nation trade status from the so-called human rights record. I made the same argument in a group presentation in an economics class.

Clinton also played a major role in facilitating China's entry into the World Trade Organization in 2001, a transformative event for both China and the world.

Besides academics, the Aloha Spirit, which is very much about love, compassion and mutual respect, made my year there a memorable experience. This week, while meeting old friends, another purpose of my trip was to go tomb sweeping for an old couple who had both passed away. They were like family to me, taking me on trips and inviting me to their home at Manoa Valley. They had visited me in China and I visited them in Hawaii a couple of times, including when I was there to cover the Rim of the Pacific naval exercise in 2016. It is a US-led multinational naval war game held biennially in even-numbered years around the Hawaiian islands. China was invited for the first time in 2014 and the second time in 2016.

Unfortunately, the US sent a formal invitation to China for the 2018 exercise but later disinvited the country. It was such a horrible mistake. Military-to-military exchanges have been inadequate between the two countries but are critical for them to avoid misunderstanding and miscalculations. I have heard stories about Chinese and US naval vessels coming in close contact in the South China Sea but the situation got defused because it turned out that the two captains knew each other from the RIMPAC drills and ended up chatting about the lunch they had that day.

In the past, Chinese and US officials in various sectors knew each other much better than they do today because they met every year at the dozens of bilateral mechanisms such as the Strategic and Economic Dialogue, and the Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade.

China and the US are the two major countries that will impact the world. There is no doubt that exchanges, whether through fellowships such as the one I did in Hawaii in 1993 or through bilateral meetings at the government level, will contribute to better understanding and peace and prosperity of both countries and the world.

Indeed, the more differences you have, the more exchanges you need.

The author is a China Daily columnist.

chenweihua@chinadaily.com.cn