For the past 35 years, American table tennis player Jack Howard
has been wondering how China's ace player Li Furong made that
killer smash during the US team's first visit to China in 1971.
Now, he finally got a chance to ask Li in person.
"His attack was amazing and, at that time, I didn't see the ball
at all," joked the 72-year-old from California.
Led by Howard, the then US table tennis team captain, an
American delegation is visiting China to mark the 35th anniversary
of the renowned "ping-pong diplomacy" in Sino-US relations.
"I am overwhelmed coming back to China after 35 years," said
Howard during a reception in Beijing yesterday.
"Everything has changed in China, but the friendship between the
two nations will not change."
The US table tennis team's visit in 1971 took place after nearly
two decades of estrangement and antagonism between the two
countries. The team, consisting of 15 players and three
journalists, made a breakthrough of historic proportions with their
spur-of-the-moment visit to China.
The US team received a surprise invitation from China during the
31st World Table Tennis Championship in Japan on April 6; and
responded by arriving in Beijing for a friendly competition,
ushering in an era of "ping-pong diplomacy."
The visit, which was called "The ping heard round the world" by
Time magazine, is seen as the first move in the game of
high-stakes negotiations that ended hostility between the US and
China and paved the way for the normalization of bilateral
relations.
From April 11 to 17, a curious American public followed the
daily progress of the visit in newspapers and on television, as the
Americans played and lost exhibition matches with their hosts,
toured the Great Wall and the Summer Palace, and chatted with
Chinese students and factory workers.
The then-Premier Zhou Enlai received the Americans at a banquet
in the Great Hall of the People on April 14 and told the unlikely
diplomats: "You have opened a new chapter in the relations of the
American and Chinese people. I am confident that this beginning
again of our friendship will certainly meet with the support of our
two peoples."
The same day, the US announced plans to lift a 20-year embargo
on trade with China; and a Chinese table tennis team reciprocated
by visiting the US the same year.
In the fall of 1971, the- then US Secretary of State Henry
Kissinger visited China, and Richard Nixon became the first
American president to visit China in February 1972.
This time, seven members of the original US delegation have come
on the visit, which started yesterday and ends on April 4.
The delegation will participate in a friendly tournament with
Chinese players in Beijing tomorrow and then leave for Shanghai and
Changshu in East China's Jiangsu Province for more matches and a
series of activities.
"The tour has sparked our memories and makes me remember the
days when the little ball changed the world," said US team member
Tim Boggan.
The tour marks the third celebration of ping-pong diplomacy
following the 25th and 30th anniversaries in 1996 and 2001.
(China Daily March 28, 2006)
