Chinese volunteer teachers feel Mandarin fever in Kyrgyzstan

US high school students who participate in a summer camp learn calligraphy in Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu province in China. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Jiao Yan's Chinese culture experience courses, teaching paper-cutting, calligraphy, tai chi and Chinese songs, at International University of Kyrgyzstan were very popular among local students. As a Chinese postgraduate who has taught Chinese in Kyrgyzstan for two months, she has felt the importance of the Chinese language for students to secure a good job.

Li Beibei, who teaches Chinese at Kyrgyz Economic University, said students here are working hard to learn Chinese in order to study in China in the future or a leg up when looking for a job.

Jiao and Li are among the seven graduates from Northwest China's Lanzhou University chosen by the National Office for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language as volunteers to teach Chinese in Kyrgyzstan.

As a country along China's Belt and Road Initiative, Kyrgyzstan has witnessed Chinese investment in recent years thanks to a good relationship and frequent trade contacts between the two countries.

With these favorable conditions, both Jiao and Li believe that the Mandarin fever will continue and graduates with fluent Chinese will be in great demand among Chinese companies or Sino-Kyrgyzstan joint ventures.

A law school where Kong Juan teaches Chinese includes the language in final examinations and calculates credits. An institute of diplomacy has held a poetry exhibition by Li Bai, a famous Chinese poet in Tang Dynasty (618-907).

"Communication is a prerequisite of commercial intercourse," said the volunteer teachers, who also study Kyrgyzstan's official languages - Russian and Kyrgyz - to better communicate with local people.