Recently, 39 foreign teachers and international students from Civil Aviation University of China visited the China Ethnic Culture Park in Beijing. The China Ethnic Culture Park is a large-scale tourist attraction focused on the heritage, cultural relics and everyday life of 56 ethnic Chinese groups. Through the visit, foreign teachers and international students can understand and enjoy different ethnic cultures and customs, and improve their knowledge of traditional Chinese culture.
CAUC teachers and students visited the museums of some ethnic groups including Zang, Dai, Bai, Mongolia and Naxi, etc., and they joined the ethnic groups’ dance recitals and folk activities. In the Park’s Dai village, the teachers and students learnt the customs of Water-Sprinkling Festival and joined the water-sprinkling activities with people from the Ethnic group of Dai. Rahman Md Musfiqur, a student from Bangladesh said, “I’m very happy to learn that Water-Sprinkling Festival marks the beginning of a new year in the ethnic group of Dai and it indicates happiness and auspiciousness. I think this visit is great and I hope we can have more activities like this to learn more about the Chinese culture in the future.”
In the Park’s Mongolia village, the teachers and students watched the traditional Mongolian dances. Ganzorig Purevmaa, a student from Mongolia cheered, “That’s great!” She felt a strong sense of familiarity due to the similarities of languages and cultures between China’s ethnic group of Mongolia and her home country.
The number of international students in CAUC has been increasing rapidly. In 2018, CAUC welcomed 44 new international students from Bangladesh, Mongolia, Russia, Tajikistan etc., 17 of them are registered in the bachelor’s program of Communication Engineering which is taught in English. CAUC began to accept international students from 1992 and it has cultivated more than one thousand long-term and short-term international students.
