AKP Phnom Penh, October 5, 2026 —
With music filling the National Mall and the US Capitol behind the stage, Chinese and American artists gathered on Saturday for "Future Resonance — ShanghaiEye Night" people-to-people exchange events.
As part of the "Shanghai Let's Meet" city promotion initiative, the program brought together artists, young people, business representatives and community leaders from the two countries, beginning with an outdoor gala there and continuing with a dinner at the Mayflower Hotel. Chinese Ambassador to the United States Xie Feng and Maryland Secretary of State Susan Lee were among the guests.
Artists from China and the United States shared the National Mall stage in a program that brought together traditional Chinese arts, contemporary works and Western classics. Renowned Chinese instrumentalist Fang Jinlong and Huangmei Opera artist Han Zaifen were among the featured performers.
The program also included Peking Opera, excerpts from Carmen and La Traviata, and music from the Chinese video game Black Myth: Wukong, performed by Lin Wei, Jin Ziqi, Zhang Zheng and the Manhattan Philharmonic Society. The outdoor gala concluded with 40 members of the One Voice Children's Choir singing We Are Together.
Speaking at the dinner, Xie said the event came only days after President Xi Jinping's state visit to the United States and testified to the vibrant cultural exchanges between the two countries. "While our two countries have different histories and cultures, that is no reason for estrangement, but rather an impetus to celebrate our diversity," he said.
Xie highlighted the importance of people-to-people and youth exchanges. Building on the "50,000 in five years" initiative, which was completed ahead of schedule, President Xi has invited 100,000 young Americans to visit China for exchanges and study in the coming five years, he said.
Xie said Shanghai plays an indispensable role in friendly engagement between China and the United States, Shanghai Media Group serves as an important bridge for China-US cultural exchanges, and Maryland is "a pioneer in bilateral subnational interactions and 'pickleball diplomacy'".
Xie also drew on the story of American teacher Ronald Sakolsky and Chinese desert control worker Yin Yuzhen. The $5,000 in funding Sakolsky secured from a US charity helped purchase 50,000 saplings, while Yin cared for the trees for more than two decades. "When two individuals from our two countries join hands, the impossible becomes possible. Just imagine: If more people come together and our two countries move in the same direction, what bigger miracles can we create?" Xie said.
"With the eight deliverables achieved during our presidents' summit and a series of mutually beneficial arrangements reached between the two economic and trade teams, we are witnessing brighter prospects for China-US cooperation," Xie said.
Referring to the Mayflower Hotel, which once housed China's Liaison Office in the United States, he said the venue had witnessed the historic normalization in the China-US relationship.
The envoy noted that the most important inspiration from the past decades is that "China and the United States stand to gain from cooperation and lose from confrontation".
Also speaking at the dinner, Maryland Secretary of State Lee said the cultural, artistic and musical events bring America, Maryland and China closer together and can lead to further cultural and youth exchanges.
Maryland established a sister-state relationship with Anhui province in 1980 and renewed the agreement last year, she said. "While government diplomacy is so very important, equally so is people-to-people diplomacy," Lee said.
At the dinner, Xie also presented awards to individuals and organizations recognized for their contributions to China-US business, people-to-people ties, social responsibility, and youth and cultural exchanges.

Sean Stein, president of the US-China Business Council, said his organization has worked for more than 50 years to improve commerce and trade between the two countries. "And that mission hasn't changed. That mission continues to this day," he said. Stein also said the number of American companies that have invested in Shanghai keeps going up and stressed the importance of mutual understanding. He said understanding "begins with an understanding of a country's history, a country's culture, and most of all, a country's people".
Sakolsky, whose tree-planting story was cited by Xie earlier in the evening, turned to the young people in the room. "The young people are our seeds. We must water them because they will become our future," he said. He also stressed what people of different countries share in common: "It's not a Chinese Earth, it's not an American Earth. It's one Earth."
Jeff Rogers, chief executive officer of Musco Lighting, an Iowa-based company with ties to China dating back to the 1990s, spoke about a youth softball exchange program launched with partners in Shanghai two years ago. Instead of simply having Chinese and American teams compete against each other, the program mixed players from the two countries so they could play together. "We look forward to the opportunity to continue to have kids and people learn the world is more the same than it is different," Rogers said.
The ShanghaiEye Night events were held under the guidance of the Information Office of the Shanghai Municipal People's Government and jointly organized by Shanghai Media Group, the World Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center and the Washington Chinese Community Alliance.

AKP-China Daily