My first visit to Guangdong was as early as 1990. After that, I returned to Guangdong from time to time, and by 2013, I had visited the province more than a dozen times. Yet, most of those visits were little more than passing through—changing trains, catching a connection, spending a day or two meeting someone, or simply buying something.
I knew Guangdong, but I did not yet have a story with Guangdong.
Guangdong was the pioneer of China's reform and opening-up. When I was studying at a Chinese university outside Guangdong in the late 1980s, I often heard stories about the province's remarkable development. In those days, what Guangdong had achieved yesterday or the year before, other parts of China seemed likely to achieve today or this year.
In 1995, after completing my Master's degree in Clinical Neurology, I returned to my motherland, Nepal, and began my professional career there.
In 2012, I was elected President of the Arniko Society, Nepal, an organization of Nepalese graduates from different Chinese universities. In fact, the Arniko Society already had a formal relationship of cooperation with the Guangdong Provincial People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (GPAFFC) when I became President. During my tenure, the relationship between the two organizations became increasingly active and vibrant.
With foreign friends of Guangdong during the inauguration ceremony of the First 21st Century Maritime Silk Road Expo in Dongguan
And that was when my real story with Guangdong began.
From 2013 onward, there were more frequent exchanges and mutual visits between the two organizations. I was invited to visit different parts of Guangdong and to witness, at close range, the province's development at different levels. The leaders of GPAFFC and the Guangdong provincial government also visited Nepal several times.
In 2013, Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed the Belt and Road Initiative. Guangdong, with its long history as an important starting point of the ancient Maritime Silk Road, was naturally closely connected with this new initiative. In 2014, Dongguan, an important city in Guangdong, hosted the first Maritime Silk Road Expo, and I was fortunate enough to be invited to attend its inaugural ceremony.
Having heavy makeup applied for the live TV program "Friends of Guangdong"
I still remember that after attending the ceremony, I wrote an article about the event and the ancient Maritime Silk Road, a subject that only a very few Nepalese people knew about at that time. The article was later published in the weekly supplement of one of Nepal's national daily newspapers.
Because Guangdong had been at the forefront of China's opening to the outside world, many of its smaller cities also had their own People's Associations for Friendship with Foreign Countries. During our various activities in Guangdong, we had opportunities to meet the leaders of these organizations.
With the facilitation and support of GPAFFC, the Arniko Society signed memorandums of understanding with friendship associations in Foshan, Dongguan and Zhongshan. These exchanges opened many new doors for our organization and created opportunities for ordinary people to get to know one another better.
During those particularly active years, I was once invited to Guangzhou to participate in a live television program about "Friends of Guangdong."
Although I had appeared on television several times, both in China and in Nepal, this experience was special in many ways.
With leaders of GPAFFC during the welcome dinner organized by GPAFFC in honor of foreign guests
First, the preparation was extraordinarily serious. The organizers had appointed a director to work on my case nearly six months before the program. She took her job very seriously. She searched the internet for almost everything she could find about me, simply to understand how I should be introduced to the audience. She even contacted some of my former Chinese teachers and classmates to "investigate" me.
They considered me somewhat special and gave me two minutes more than others, because, unlike many of the other guests, I had neither studied nor worked in Guangdong. Instead, I had been living in Nepal while working to promote people-to-people relations between Nepal and China.
There was another reason the program was unforgettable.
For the live television program, I was required to have heavy makeup applied to my face so that I would look "handsome" in front of the camera.
That was the first time in my life—and, so far, the only time—that anyone had tried so hard to make me more handsome.
The program was recorded and was also shown on a large outdoor screen on a busy street in Guangzhou. Two of my classmates who were living there happened to see me. They were so excited that they immediately told me they had seen me on the screen.
The Arniko Society also helped Nepalese students participate twice in international painting competitions organized by GPAFFC. It was especially gratifying for me that, on both occasions, one or two of the Nepalese students we recommended won prizes.
In 2022, I was nominated as an overseas member of the Board of Directors of GPAFFC.
I have never felt that I have done anything extraordinary for GPAFFC. But I have always kept one thought in my mind: I should do whatever I can to promote people-to-people friendship between Nepal and China, and particularly between the people of Nepal and the people of Guangdong.
These days, I am no longer the President of the Arniko Society. Many things have changed over the years, and life has taken me in many different directions.
But one thing has not changed.
My Guangdong story is still continuing.
The author is Dr. Sarbottam Shrestha, Arniko Society, Nepal.
Photos provided for South by the author
