Ji Ping, deputy secretary-general of the China Foundation for Peace and Development, makes a speech at the National Library on July 24. [Photo by Mao Jing]

Fifty students and teachers from the earthquake area of Ya’an, Sichuan province, are flying to Hungary for study exchange on July 25.

On April 20, a 7-magnitude earthquake occurred in Lushan, Ya’an. During the China-EU High-level Political Forum on April 22-23 in Suzhou, deputy chairman of the Hungarian Socialist Party István Ujhelyi invited 50 students from Lushan to participate in a study exchange in Hungary, with Hungary bearing all the costs.

The trip will be from July 25 to Aug 6, during which the students will visit Budapest, Lake Balaton and the Confucius Institute at University of Szeged. They will learn the local language and culture, participate in dancing, painting and various sports.

A pre-departure training was held on July 24. The students visited the National Library, the National Museum and watched the flag-lowering ceremony at Tian’anmen Square.

On July 24 at the National Library in Beijing, Ji Ping, deputy secretary-general of the China Foundation for Peace and Development, which is coordinating the trip, said the trip to Hungary is aimed at learning about Hungarian national culture and showing the spirit of the Chinese people.

Zhao Lei from the International Department of the Central Committee of CPC told the students about the culture of Hungary, and Chen Li, deputy curator of the National Library, showed the students around the library and encouraged them to read more books.

Curator of the National Library Zhou Heping donated some picture books to help the students recover from the trauma of the quake.

This is not the first time István Ujhelyi gave support to China. He had promoted the Hungarian government to invite Chinese students for recuperation in Hungary after the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, and in 2010 after the Qinghai earthquake, he also invited students from the disaster area to Shanghai World Expo.

The study exchange is also supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Education, Sichuan Provincial Government, Chinese Embassy in Hungary and the Hungarian Embassy.