The German-Division's final of the 17th "Chinese Bridge" Chinese Proficiency Competition was held in Düsseldorf, Germany, Saturday, marking an end to the series of events in Germany.  

Sponsored by the Chinese Embassy in Germany and co-organized by the Confucius institute at the University of Düsseldorf, the topic of this year's event is "One World, One Family". 20 university students from various parts of Germany performed speaking Chinese. 

An Estonian student Meng Ande received the first place for the competition. He decided to learn Chinese after falling in love with Chinese cuisine that his father was trying to make. As champion for Germany, he will attend the final global event in China, a country he "had never been to".

"Learning a foreign language is like crossing a bridge, as it offers language learners a platform to enter a new world, to get access to people in that world, and to further establish friendship and mutual trust through exchanges of ideas," said Liu Lixin, Minister-Counsellor at Chinese Embassy in Germany.

In the end, a judge at the event, University of Trier Professor Liang Yong, said, "Swedish famous Sinologist Klas Karlgren had published a book called 'The Chinese Language and the Chinese Script'. It's a monograph of an overseas study on modern Chinese culture. In this book, Karlgren believes the artistic and literal value of Chinese nearly equals Latin. Karlgren is also surprised at the status of the Chinese language in Europe. Today, over 1 million young students from over 100 countries are willing to learn Chinese and participated in the 'Chinese Bridge'. In Germany, the number of contestants from non-Sinology majors is increasing."    

The "Chinese Bridge" Chinese Proficiency Competition is a large-scale international contest carried out by Confucius Institute Headquarters (Hanban) in cooperation with local governments. It is well-known for the cultural and educational exchanges worldwide.

(Video source: Feng Xuejun, edited by Cao Yanghong)