At the ninth annual Chinese Bridge—a Chinese language proficiency competition for foreign secondary school students, Wei Xing was a bit different from the other competitors. The 15-year-old boy from Bangladesh took his elder brother Wu Qiu to the competition venue.

Wu Qiu participated in the 2012 Chinese Bridge competition on behalf of Bangladesh. He not only won the Most Eloquent Speaker Award, but also helped his team take the third place. He is currently studying computer science at the University of Science and Technology Beijing. This time, Wu Qiu made a special trip to Yunnan to cheer for his younger brother at this years’ Chinese Bridge competition.

During an interview, Wu Qiu and Wei Xing recalled their experiences learning Chinese. Quite by coincidence, the two brothers’ father was once a senior reporter at The Independent, a Bangladeshi newspaper that is now collaborating with Yunnan Daily Press Group in issuing “China•Yunnan”, an English-language newspaper page.

Later, according to Wei Xing, their father moved to Beijing to work for China Radio International’s Bengali channel. Following in their father’s footsteps, the family lived in China for nine years. After returning to Bangladesh, their father became a professor of Chinese at the local Confucius Institute. The brothers’ deep love of Chinese today is largely due to the influence of their father. They agreed that the Chinese attainments of their father had been a big motivation for their learning Chinese.

In Wu Qiu’s opinion, many young people in Bangladesh now know China and have begun to learn Chinese because of China’s technological products. Huawei, Xiaomi, Lenovo, Gionee and many other Chinese brands are popular in Bangladesh. “Made in China” products are attracting a growing number of Bangladeshi young people to study in China. Unlike his elder brother, who is studying computer science, Wei Xing hopes to one day become an engineer so that he can contribute to future development of both China and Bangladesh.