The opening ceremony of the first Confucius Classroom in Australia's island state of Tasmania was held on Thursday at Scotch Oakburn College in Launceston.
Chinese Consul General in Melbourne Song Yumin said in the keynote speech that the opening of this Confucius Classroom comes at a time that coincides with the one year anniversary of Chinese President Xi Jinping's historic visit to Tasmania which locates in southeast of the country.
"It brought back my memories of the meeting of 22 students with President Xi and Madam Peng at the Government House one year ago," Song said.
"It was an exciting moment and life long memory for me, and so is for you, I believe," he told the students.
He stressed the visit had substantially promoted the relations between China and Australia.
"Great progresses have been made since the visit. I happily find that a solid connection is established," he said, "The Confucius Classroom is another very important landmark of our friendship. Learning of each other's language and culture is crucial in the development of a friendship."
Song told the students that they are the future. The sister-ships between Scotch Oakburn College and Jingshan School of Beijing are more important than trade figures, which will nurture the shared future of both China and Australia.
This Confucius Classroom is the very first of its kind the whole state of Tasmania. According to staff of Scotch Oakburn College, the Confucius Classroom will undoubtedly provide the students with a wonderful platform to improve their command of Chinese language and culture, and will also play an exemplary role in promoting the Chinese language teaching and learning in Tasmania.
Student representative Eason Hamilton gave a beautiful speech on behalf of the students in both fluent Chinese and English.
"I'm very interested in Chinese language and Chinese culture that's why I love mandarin. So I would like to thank you for opening the Confucius Classroom in our school, it will help us to learn more about China and Chinese language, culture and history," the seven-grade boy said.
Andy Muller, the school principle told Xinhua that they were very honored and very excited about the opening of the first Confucius Classroom, and since the visit of President Xi one year ago, Scotch Oakburn was blessed with the development of the wonderful relationship between China and Australia.
Last November, President Xi paid a historic visit to the heart-shaped island, which put Tasmania in spotlight of world wide attention for the first time. Generations of preparations had been done by the political and business leaders of Tasmania to accomplish this visit, but it was a handful of students who gave the final nudge.
Students from Scotch Oakburn College made a case for Xi to visit the remote island state by sending him a letter written in Chinese describing scenic sites and local specialties. "Their words have filled me with curiosity," Xi told the lawmakers when addressing the Australian parliament in Canberra before his unprecedented visit to Tasmania.
This May, 22 Scotch Oakburn College students, together with parents and teachers, were invited by President Xi for a week-long visit to China during which they met with Peng Liyuan, President Xi's wife, at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in central Beijing.
Muller asked Song to convey thanks and appreciation of the school to Chinese government for their cooperation and tireless support for the study and the expansion of Chinese language in Australia, and to Chinese people for their warm welcome.
12-year-old Bronte told Xinhua that she made the decision of learning Chinese on her own, "because I found Chinese language and culture are very interesting." The seven-grade girl want to be a journalist in the future, and reporting in Chinese obviously can help her own more audience, a lot more.
