Language is the bridge of cultural communication. With the deepening of China's opening to the world, people’s interest in China and its culture has increased with more and more foreign friends start to learn Chinese. But as we listen to Alistair Bayley, a young “Wanghong” or internet celebrity from Australia, we will find out that learning Chinese sometimes means far beyond mastering a new language skill, but an encounter with the country and its people as well.
July 31 in 2013 was an important day for Alistair Bayley, as he won the champion in a Chinese proficiency competition for foreign university students, known as Hanyu Qiao, or Chinese Bridge. At this TV show, Bayley was welcomingly called "Xiao Bei" by Chinese netizens. Since then, his special relationship with China has turned a new page.
Bayley was born in Japan. At the age of 6, he moved to East China's Shanghai city with his parents. For Bayley, Shanghai is a very fascinating and green city that has impressed him with many beautiful sceneries. It was then that a seed of his love for Chinese took root in his heart.
Bayley: I think it's a really interesting city because it's a very sort of East meets West. In a city, you know you're walking along in some old Chinese Lane way and then all of a sudden you get to the end of a street. There's a skyscraper, that kind of thing. And so I always found that really fascinating as a kid, it's kind of like when you're walking through Disneyland, and you kind of going through the whole enchanted area, and then all of a sudden you find yourself in Tomorrowland and everything is modern and high tech and everything like that.
That experience allowed him to pick up the Chinese language at an early age and after years living in China, he becomes fascinated by Chinese culture. Later, after returning to Australia with his family, Bayley still continued to learn the language and even went to Chinese school on the weekends.
Bayley: Whereas for me when I went back to China like I mean I went to Chinese school on the weekends on Saturday mornings from nine to twelve. I was there with the other like Chinese experts learning Chinese and then in year ten I took my year twelve Chinese exam and so I sort of kept looking for ways to use Chinese and do that. And I think that's honestly the best thing you can do is finding uses and finding ways to expose yourself to and immerse yourself in the language environment.
For Bayley, learning Chinese has changed his life. 2015, Bayley participated in the Informal Talks, a well-known Chinese TV show focusing on the discussion of customs and cultures of various countries. The success of this show also brought Bayley some popularity and influence among Chinese youngsters.
Bayley: There's eleven foreigners and we sit around. We sit around a big table and discuss various issues whether they like, they usually trending topics. So we usually try and associate something to something that's going on in Chinese media at the time or Chinese social media and so you know we do, we do all of that kind of stuff and then we also introduce our own things from our own countries as well.
Bayley: So I think it's a really valuable platform. We all get to air different opinions and it's a way for our young audience to be exposed to a lot of ideas that they may not necessarily be exposed to normally.
Since the episode went out, there were so many fans send messages to his personal Chinese social platform called “weibo”. At that time, Bayley suddenly felt what him say actually does go into people's hearts and actually does have an impact on them.
Bayley: And I think that's just a really nice impact to have in someone's life, to be able to bring that happiness, but also be some kind of a support or a voice to some feelings that they may be having that they can't really associate with into words. So yeah, in terms of that, I think it's, it's been a really big change.
Besides, Bayley is also a member of a popular Chinese new media program called “ Y China”. It’s committed to showing the Chinese development and culture in the form of short videos through the perspective of foreign youth.
Bayley: The communication that China has with the outside world is on a very upper level, and there's a lot of sort of governmental talks that happens, a lot of that kind of contact. But there's very little of what people living in China, people who have been exposed to China at the grassroots, what they think and what life really is like.
For Bayley, his wish is to show people overseas what life in China really is like, let the world understand China better, and explore Chinese stories from the perspective of foreigners.
On Bayley’s personal social platform, he uses short videos to show China's advanced technologies, showing the world the speed of China's development. Besides, he challenges the Chinese college entrance examination, showing the charm of Chinese culture to the world.
Bayley: I think it's a really unique and powerful format in that sense because it is something where you can put your own personal feelings into words, you can share a little bit of your personality with your audience and it's something where they can engage with and then they can start their own conversations based on that stuff that they've been exposed to as well.
In these videos, Bayley is not a foreigner who keep a distance from China, but a foreigner who caught in the tide of China's development. Lots of foreigners like Bayley are telling a true and objective Chinese story by introducing their own perspective of things to outside and parts of their own life in China and then let the world understand China better.